Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
I hear a lot of folks give the following explanation for the vagaries of the climate, viz:
It’s the sun, stupid.
And in fact, when I first started looking at the climate I thought the very same thing. How could it not be the sun, I reasoned, since obviously that’s what heats the planet.
Unfortunately, the dang facts got in the way again …
Chief among the dang facts is that despite looking in a whole lot of places, I never could find any trace of the 11-year sunspot cycle in any climate records. And believe me, I’ve looked.
You see, I reasoned that no matter whether the mechanism making the sun-climate connection were direct variations in the brightness of the sun, or variations in magnetic fields, or variations in UV, or variations in cosmic rays, or variations in the solar wind, they all run in synchronicity with the sunspots. So no matter the mechanism, it would have a visible ~11-year heartbeat.
I’ve looked for that 11-year rhythm every place I could think of—surface temperature records, sea level records, lake level records, wheat price records, tropospheric temperature records, river flow records. Eventually, I wrote up some of these findings, and I invited readers to point out some record, any record, in which the ~ 11-year sunspot cycle could be seen.
Nothing.
However, I’m a patient man, and to this day, I continue to look for the 11-year cycle. You can’t prove a negative … but you can amass evidence. My latest foray is into the world of atmospheric pressure. I figured that the atmospheric pressure might be more sensitive to variations in something like say the solar wind than the temperature would be.
Let me start, however, by taking a look at the elusive creature at the heart of this quest, the ~11-year sunspot cycle. Here is the periodogram of that cycle, so that we know what kind of signature we’re looking for:
Figure 1. Periodogram, showing the strengths of the various-length cycles in the SIDC sunspot data. In order to be able to compare disparate datasets, the values of the cycles are expressed as a percentage of the total range of the underlying data.
As you’d expect, the main peak is at around 11 years. However, the sunspot cycles are not regular, so we also have smaller peaks at nearby cycle lengths. Figure 2 shows an expanded view of the central part of Figure 1, showing only the range from seven to twenty-five years:
Figure 2. The same periodogram as in Figure 1, but showing only the 7 – 25 year range.
Now, there is a temptation to see the central figure as some kind of regular amplitude-modulated signal, with side-lobes. However, that’s not what’s happening here. There is no regular signal. Instead of there being a regular cycle, the length of the sunspot cycle varies widely, from about nine to about 15 years, with most of them in the 10-12 year range. The periodogram is merely showing that variation in cycle length.
In any case, that’s what we’re looking for—some kind of strong signal, with its peak value in the range of about 10-12 years.
As I mentioned above, when I started looking at the climate, like many people I thought “It’s the sun, stupid”, but I had found no data to back that up. So what did I find in my latest search? Well, sweet Fannie Adams, as our cousins across the pond say … here are my results:
Figure 3. Periodograms of four long-term atmospheric pressure records from around the globe.
There are some interesting features of these records.
First, there is a very strong annual cycle. I expected annual cycles, but not ones that large. These cycles are 30% to 60% of the total range of the data. I assume they result in large part from the prevalence of low-pressure areas associated with storms in the local wintertime, combined with some effect from the variations in temperature. I also note that as expected, Tahiti, being nearest to the equator and with little in the way of either temperature variations or low-pressure storms, has the smallest one-year cycle.
Other than semi-annual and annual cycles, however, there is very little power in the other cycle lengths. Figure 4 shows the expanded version of the same data, from seven to twenty-five years. Note the change in scale.
Figure 4. Periodograms of four long-term atmospheric pressure records from around the globe.
First, note that unlike the size of the annual cycle, which is half the total swing in pressures, none of these cycles have more than about 4% of the total swing of the atmospheric pressure. These are tiny cycles.
Next, generally there is more power in the ~ 9-year and the ~ 13-14 year ranges than there is in the ~ 11-year cycles.
So … once again, I end up back where I started. I still haven’t found any climate datasets that show any traces of the 11-year sunspot cycles. They may be there in the pressure data, to be sure, it is impossible to prove a negative, I can’t say they’re not there … but if so, they are hiding way, way down in the weeds.
Which of course leads to the obvious question … why no sign of the 11-year solar cycles?
I hold that this shows that the temperature of the system is relatively insensitive to changes in forcing. This, of course, is rank heresy to the current scientific climate paradigm, which holds that ceteris paribus, changes in temperature are a linear function of changes in forcing. I disagree. I say that the temperature of the planet is set by a dynamic thermoregulatory system composed of emergent phenomena that only appear when the surface gets hotter than a certain temperature threshold. These emergent phenomena maintain the temperature of the globe within narrow bounds (e.g. ± 0.3°C over the 20th Century), despite changes in volcanoes, despite changes in aerosols, despite changes in GHGs, despite changes in forcing of all kinds. The regulatory system responds to temperature, not to forcing.
And I say that because of the existence of these thermoregulatory systems, the 11-year variations in the sun’s UV and magnetism and brightness, as well as the volcanic variations and other forcing variations … well, they make little difference.
As a result, once again, I open the Quest for the Holy 11-Year Grail to others. I invite those that believe that “It’s the sun, stupid” to show us the terrestrial climate record that has any sign of being correlated with the 11-year sunspot cycles. I’ve looked. Lots of folks have looked … where is that record? I encourage you to employ whatever methods you want to use to expose the connection—cross-correlation, wavelet analysis, spectrum analysis, fourier analysis, the world is your lobster. Report back your findings, I’d like to put this question to bed.
It’s a lovely Saturday in spring, what could be finer? Gotta get outside and study me some sunshine. I wish you all many such days.
w.
For Clarity: If you disagree with someone, please quote their exact words that you disagree with. It avoids all kinds of pernicious misunderstandings, because it lets us all know exactly where you think they went off the rails.
Why The 11-year Cycle?: Because it is the biggest cycle, and we know all of the other cycles (magnetism, TSI, solar wind) move in synchronicity with the sunspots. As a result, if you want to claim that the climate is responding to say a slow, smaller 100-year cycle in the sunspot data, then by the same token it must be responding more strongly to the larger 11-cycle in the sunspot data, and so the effect should be visible there.
The Subject Of This Post: Please do not mistake this quest for the elusive 11-year cycle in climate datasets as an opportunity for you to propound your favorite theory about approximately 43-year pseudo-cycles due to the opposition of Uranus. If you can’t show me a climate dataset containing an 11-year cycle, your hypothesis is totally off-topic for this post. I encourage you to write it up and send it to Anthony, he may publish it, or to Tallbloke, he might also. I encourage everyone to get their ideas out there. Here on this thread, though, I’m looking for the 11-year cycle sunspot cycle in any terrestrial climate records.
The Common Cycles in Figures 3 and 4: Obviously, the four records in Figs. 3 & 4 have a common one-year cycle. As an indication of the sensitivity of the method that I’m using, consider the two other peaks which are common to all four of the records. These are the six-month cycle, and the 9-year cycle. It is well known that the moon raises tides in the atmosphere just as it does in the ocean. The 9-year periodicity is not uncommon in tidal datasets, and the same is true about the 6-month periodicity. I would say that we’re looking at the signature of the atmospheric tides in those cycle lengths.
Variable-Length Cycles, AKA “Pseudocycles” or “Approximate Cycles”: Some commenters in the past have asserted that my method, which I’ve nicknamed “Slow Fourier Analysis” but which actually seems to be a variant of what might be called direct spectrum analysis, is incapable of detecting variable-length cycles. They talk about a cycle say around sixty years that changes period over time.
However, the sunspot cycle is also quite variable in length … and despite that my method not only picks up the most common cycle length, it shows the strength of the sunspot cycles at the other cycle lengths as well.
A Couple of my Previous Searches for the 11-Year Sunspot Cycle:
Looking at four long-term temperature records here.
A previous look at four more long-term temperature records.
Atmospheric Pressure and Sunspot Data:
Tahiti to 1950 and Tahiti 1951 on (note different units)
Darwin to 1950 and Darwin 1951 on (note different units)
Sunspots These are from SIDC. Note that per advice from Leif Svalgaard, in the work I did above the pre-1947 values have been increased by 20% to adjust for the change in counting methods. It does not affect this analysis, you can use either one.
For ease of downloading, I’ve also made up a CSV file containing all of the above data, called Long Term Atmospheric Pressure.csv
And for R users, I’ve saved all 5 data files in R format as “Long Pressure Datasets.tab”
Code: Man, I hate this part … hang on … let me clean it up a bit … OK, I just whacked out piles of useless stuff and ran it in an empty workspace and it seemed to fly. You need two things, a file called madras pressure.R and my Slow Fourier Transform Functions.R. Let me know what doesn’t work.
“I hold that this shows that the temperature of the system is relatively insensitive to changes in forcing. This, of course, is rank heresy to the current scientific climate paradigm, which holds that ceteris paribus, changes in temperature are a linear function of changes in forcing.”
The standard climate science view is not that the climate is insensitive to changes in solar forcing, but that no significant changes have happened. That, while the sun is indeed the energy source, it is a very steady source. So no stability mechanism need be postulated.
“no significant changes have happened”
OK, I can hear the protests – I mean no big oscillations in solar output in the period Willis is looking at.
I don’t know about the 11 year cycle having an effect on weather/climate, but it seems that a “bunch” of 11 year cycles with high sunspot activity makes for a warmer climate. Also when you get a “bunch” of 11 year cycles with lower sunspot activity you get an overall cooler climate:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/29/headlines-over-solar-cycle-25-and-potential-cooling/
Reblogged this on The Next Grand Minimum and commented:
Willis Eschenbach on another quest for the facts makes for some interesting reading, there may not be a 11 year solar cycle evident in the earths climate record. Any ideas, on what causes climate cycles if it is not the sun?
“ceteris paribus” Willis “Monkton” Eschenbach I presume.
I don’t see why there should be a visible 11 year cycle in temperature records or much else for that matter, I think the system is so complex and buffered that such brief changes in forcing that may be present in the 11 year cycle will not and should not show. Longer lasting changes however would seem to exist, the Dalton, the Maunder with the river Thames freezing. We might get to find out over the coming years.
Nick Stokes says:
May 24, 2014 at 1:46 pm
Dear heavens, save me from pettifogging lawyers. Nick, the standard view is exactly what I said it was—that changes in temperature are a linear function of the changes in forcing. If you don’t understand that, read up on the supposed “climate sensitivity”. It has nothing to do with the sun at all.
w.
Sunspots are not causing anything and don’t know of anyone who said they were. It is a proxy for the sun’s magnetic activity and not a particularly good one. Sunspots not linked to climate does not in anyway devalue a hypothesis of a non-irradiance based influence on climate from the sun.
Have you overlooked this, a correlation of sunspots and river flow and lake levels?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/22/solar-to-river-flow-and-lake-level-correlations/
J. Philip Peterson says:
May 24, 2014 at 1:58 pm
Thanks, Philip. That’s the claim … the citation you gave didn’t provide much more than speculation to support the claim, however.
And I still don’t understand how a long, say 60 or 80 year slow small change in the sun’s output could have an effect while a much smaller decadal change doesn’t have an effect. What is the mechanism?
w.
The 11 year sunspot cycle has a distinct trend “Heart beat” with regional UK and Ireland temperatures, for example, daily sunspot numbers for January correlate well with March minimum and maximum temperatures over the length of both records.
Alex E says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:03 pm
Thanks, Alex. I didn’t say sunspots caused anything. I said they moved in parallel with other phenomena. Here are my words:
What solar mechanism are you proposing that doesn’t move in synchrony with the sunspot cycle (or the magnetic double sunspot cycle, which is simply a sunspot cycle where the polarity reverses each cycle)? The TSI, the UV, the visible light, the magnetism, the solar wind, the galactic cosmic rays, all of those move parallel to the sunspots. So what phenomenon are you referring to, that doesn’t move in harness with the sunspot cycles?
Regards,
w.
Sorry if I’m missing something obvious but I wouldn’t expect an 11 year cycle in any series. The sun cycle averages 11 years, but isn’t always 11 years. I assume it is a memory-less process, so creating an 11 year cycle will sometimes coincide with the top of the cycle, but for some years could correspond with the bottom. I assume there is a way to back out the known historical cycles to see if a measure coincides; although I would have thought that ordinary correlation would be the way to measure it.
Sparks says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:18 pm
Seems doubtful, but I’ll bite. Which “regional UK and Ireland temperatures” EXACTLY are you referring to (links)?
w.
Willis Eschenbach says: May 24, 2014 at 2:03 pm
“Dear heavens, save me from pettifogging lawyers.”
No pettifog here. Your proposition is that a lack of sunspot cycle in the data supports a “dynamic thermoregulatory system”. I say that there was no significant change in forcing in the first place, so lack of observed response does not support thermoregulation.
Maybe the standard view is wrong. The solar cycle peaks could have a strong signal, and outside the peaks anything could happen, obscuring the signal of the peaks.
The earth takes a year (or so) to go round the sun, but the sun doesn’t know this and I suspect that it sings to a different rhythm to that of the earth.
MikeUK says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:06 pm
Nope. I analyzed the Parana River dataset here.
And what David Archibald did with the lake level data is hilarious. Here’s his money graph …
What he has conclusively proven in that graph is that if he throws out the one-third of the data that doesn’t agree with his theory, the remaining two-thirds will give a great fit to his theory … please tell me you aren’t impressed …
w.
Willis Eschenbach creates a straw man and than destroys it. Stick a feather in his hat.
Willis in search for the Holy Grail, it reminds me of the Babson task. Maybe an option is to correlate the dynamics of your thermoregulatory system to the solar cycle or ap-index. There must be somewhere, somehow a connection
Perhaps I missed something, but I always thought the Nile River studies were good evidence:
http://trs-new.jpl.nasa.gov/dspace/bitstream/2014/40231/1/06-1989.pdf?origin=publication_detail
Jim
If it ain’t the sun, then it must be that elusive “dark matter” shading the sunshine.
Willis, I’m always happy to see someone other than myself pi$$ off a bunch of people. 🙂
I think it’s obvious that since one has theory that CO2 is causing warming, that is this context, one say it’s the sun rather than CO2.
The idea that without CO2, earth would be -18 C is obviously ignoring the the sun.
Now, to prove that is a sun, you looking at small cycles of cooling and warming. Let’s be clear, CO2 has no rational basis for warming up to about 2 decade ago and the pause since then.
But solar activity appears to have been more active in 20th Century than 19th or 18th, and unlike weather, people who tend to be more scientific have been watching the heavens and the sun for a longer time. Though we have only had SOHO [launched “December 2, 1995 to study the Sun”- wiki] for relatively short period of time. And if solar activity is likewise less in 21 century there goo chance this affecting weather.
So, CO2 does not have cyclic warming/cooling aspect. But “climatic scientists” have been declaring a short period of weather was caused by CO2. But since CO2 emission continues and we see no further increasing of trend in warming, we can assume CO2 does not have the warming effect these idiots, thought it had.
Now everyone knows that there are cycles which connected to the world’s oceans.which cause short term changes in climate. And seems it’s these ocean cycles which the idiots were assigning
to increasing levels of global CO2.
So CO2 is not causal factior in these ocean cycles. And it seems it’s probably related to the Sun and “natural variability”.
This video does claim and suggest STRONG correlation between tree ring data and sun, and ALSO sea diatoms:
Willis can not see the forest through the trees. Many see the data/evidence very differently.
Willis Eschenbach do you see the difference AP between the previous and the 24 cycle? Changes have begun up for good since 2006.
ftp://ftp.gfz-potsdam.de/pub/home/obs/kp-ap/ap_monyr.ave
10-4 gbaikie.. just what i was thinking.. correlation witb sun and CO2 dont pan out.. this is a complex interaction that is as yet not proven in accordance with the scientific method.. its the weather, stupid!
DamDoc
“I say that the temperature of the planet is set by a dynamic thermoregulatory system composed of emergent phenomena that only appear when the surface gets hotter than a certain temperature threshold.”
A bit off topic. It would seem that this works great for curbing warming (a number of remedies available) but cooling is more open. If cooling reaches a certain level and the system has done everything to retard the cooling, it can run out of tricks (I guess it still has heat release from freezing up its sleeve, but that’s my point). Once there are no clouds allowing for max heating, then any cooling can go on getting cooler. Perhaps this is why we have interglacials that last only 10% of the several million years of an Ice Age. Your theory may be the whole package.
Roy Spencer says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:45 pm
Willis, I’m always happy to see someone other than myself pi$$ off a bunch of people. 🙂
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Made my day…..thank you!
w – I would look differently. As The Other Phil says, the cycle isn’t always 11 years. So in using regular cycles, you are handicapping yourself. I would give each date a solar cycle number (SCN), for example the date half-way through solar cycle 5 would be 5.5, and then look for periodicities in climate by SCN rather than by date. Even during the Maunder Minimum the solar cycles were identified, I think. Now I admit that if nothing shows up as a regular date-based cycle, it’s unlikely that much will be found this way, but nevertheless it should be a more accurate method.
There is another complicating factor, and that is that climate is a complex coupled non-linear system. That means that any factor affecting climate is unlikely to have a linear effect. Put simply, sometimes you’ll see it and sometimes you won’t. So the fact that a simple periodicity analysis doesn’t find it doesn’t mean it isn’t there.
w – None of this is intended as any kind of criticism. I applaud your efforts, and if there is an effect then it is certainly possible that you may find it using your current methods. I also note carefully that you say that not finding it doesn’t mean it’s not there. I’ll add one more suggestion : Herschel(?) identified a solar cycle in crop yields. Why not first see if you can replicate his findings, using SCN. ie, look at things like temperature and rainfall over just that period in the UK. If you do find something, even if it doesn’t map over the rest of time or over other places, at least it might be a useful clue from which further progress can develop.
So its not the sun. And it ain’t CO2. What in the world is it? C’mon Willis give us a clue…
Or is it just something that we should not worry about?
I went on a hunt for the 11 year cycle a long time ago, came up empty.
I also went hunting for a 7 year cycle. There’s a passage in Laura Ingles Wilder’s book The Long Winter (Big Winter? I forget), in which the local natives come to warn the settlers that every 7th winter is harsh, and every 3rd 7th winter unusually harsh, and this was to be the 3rd 7th winter. So I went hunting for 7 and 21 year cycles with little success, though my approach was no where near as sophisticated as Willis’.
The astronomer William Herschel, reading Adam Smith’s Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations in 1801, was startled to notice a quasi-periodicity of approximately 11 years in the mean annual grain prices on the London exchange. He verified an anti-correlation between the sunspot cycle and the grain prices. More sunspots, warmer weather, more grain, lower prices: fewer sunspots, colder weather, less grain, higher prices.
One should also recall that from 1645-1715, when the Sun was at its least active in the past 11,400 years, the weather was indeed exceptionally cold on both sides of the Atlantic. The correlation may have been causative. Also, from 1925-1995, when the Sun was almost at its most active in the past 11,400 years, the weather was warmer than it had been since the Middle Ages. Now that the Sun is declining from that peak (1960, according to Hathaway), temperature has stabilized, and might be falling somewhat were it not for our influence.
Furthermore, Luedecke et al., late last year, showed that Fourier analysis on the ~60-year ocean oscillation cycle and on the longer de Vries cycle was able to reproduce global temperature change over the past 250 years with great faithfulness. The Luedecke analysis predicts a considerable drop in global temperature in the coming decades, perhaps moderated somewhat by our influence in the opposite direction.
One should not expect the ~11-year cycle to have a major influence on global temperature, owing to the homoeostatic effect of the two boundaries of the atmosphere: the near-infinite heat-sink that is the ocean and the infinite heat-sink that is outer space. Temperature will only change significantly if there is a sufficiently long period of persistently higher-than-normal solar activity (as there was during most of the past century) or lower-than-normal solar activity.
The significance of the now embarrassingly long period of no-warming over the past 17 years 9 months (RSS), or 13 years 4 months (mean of all five datasets), is that the warming effect from CO2 is insufficient to overcome the cooling effect of declining solar activity (the decline compared with 1960 is the steepest and one of the deepest in the past several hundred years) combined with the negative or cooling phase of the PDO and a recent decline in the Nino/Nina ratio.
Willis,
The number of sunspots reaches a maximum every ≈11 years, but successive maxima have spots with reversed magnetic polarity. Could there be a ≈22 year cycle?
First, I agree with you that thermoregulation is, over medium terms, a decade or so, wiping out other forcing effects. We can see short term kicks, such as volcanic activity, Forbush Decreases, short term changes in the solar wind, etc. http://notrickszone.com/2014/05/22/data-suggest-that-solar-wind-impacts-global-temperature/#comment-944818
But longer term changes can’t take place because thermoregulation, especially in the tropics, just over-ride them. That’s why the 11-year cycle doesn’t show up. It’s buried in the noise of the short term kicks.
And thank you for the solar wind data!
–Now that the Sun is declining from that peak (1960, according to Hathaway), temperature has stabilized, and might be falling somewhat were it not for our influence. —
The higher levels of CO2 could have slight effect in terms of stabilizing temperature, but I would not count on it very much though. It’s not an air bag, it’s car bumpers at best.
So I would say it could mitigate another Little Ice Age to some degree. But I do not believe it can stop glacial period from beginning [not that I believe we in danger of this].
It seems the best thing about higher CO2 levels is it helps plants grow- which is good if one is having a lot of crop failures due to colder global climate.
I learned in my classes in statistics that statistical results are like a lampposts, they light up only small areas, but they are very good to lean up against.
This in my view sums up this article.
Firstly sunspot number is a bad measure of solar activity. The 11 year solar cycle and other solar cycle are not of a fixed length, bit varies which makes standard statistical analysis dubious at best.
Earth’s temperature is much more affected by variations in solar magnetic variations than by sunspot numbers and Earth’s climate system is a non-linear chaotic system which involves many time lags effects.
Monckton of Brenchley says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:17 pm
One should not expect the ~11-year cycle to have a major influence on global temperature, owing to the homoeostatic effect of the two boundaries of the atmosphere: the near-infinite heat-sink that is the ocean and the infinite heat-sink that is outer space. Temperature will only change significantly if there is a sufficiently long period of persistently higher-than-normal solar activity (as there was during most of the past century) or lower-than-normal solar activity.
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…thanks
One small thing. Tahiti is not “nearest the equator” of the four stations cited. Darwin is, at 12.5 degrees south, Madras (Chennai) is 13.1 N, Tahiti 17.7 S and Nagasaki 32.8 N
There is an excellent correlation NOT with the 11yr sunspot cycle BUT with the 22yr magnetic cycle that strongly suggests “it’s the sun stupid”.
Climate follows Hale solar sunspot cycle http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2011/08/01/newell-climate-follows-hale-solar-sunspot-cycle/
Blue Sky says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:34 pm
Was there something unclear in my request, viz:
I have no clue what you think is a “straw man”.
w.
Roy Spencer says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:45 pm
Busted out laughing at that one, thanks, Dr. Roy.
w.
Willis, you don’t need to go to David Archibald to see links with South American river flow and the 11 year solar cycle:
http://arxiv.org/abs/1003.0414
“What solar mechanism are you proposing that doesn’t move in synchrony with the sunspot cycle (or the magnetic double sunspot cycle, which is simply a sunspot cycle where the polarity reverses each cycle)? The TSI, the UV, the visible light, the magnetism, the solar wind, the galactic cosmic rays, all of those move parallel to the sunspots. So what phenomenon are you referring to, that doesn’t move in harness with the sunspot cycles?”
==============================
The sunspot cycle doesn’t even move in synchrony with itself. it varies from 9 to 15 years, as you have indicated. You are asking why an indirect proxy with a variable frequency doesn’t have a sharp & clearly defined frequency response on climate. Why would it? Especially in a buffered system. It doesn’t make sense to me to ask why the 11 year cycle can’t be seen when we don’t even know why it varies from 9-15.
When Christensen and Lassen looked at the link between solar cycles and climate, they were looking at the length of the cycle. That sounds much more promising. If the solar activity that causes sunspots is in some kind of equilibrium point when the cycle is 11 years, then it stands to reason that factors that pull the sun out of that equilibrium could have a strong effect on climate.
Another is looking at UV. TSI varies little, UV varies quite a bit. Why not just look at that directly instead of through what is essentially a filter when you look at the 11-year cycle.
ps I still don’t know how to quote on this page. what is the command?
[Precede the text you want you blockquoted (indented and in italics) with (blockquote)
and end the selection with (/blockquote). Use < rather than parenthesis. .mod]
Jim Brown says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:38 pm
I’ve tried quite hard to replicate that study, but I’ve been unable to track down the data for both the maximum and minimum Nile river levels for the full period. I’ve found some data, here’s that analysis:
Note that there is no 11-year cycle in that dataset, at least. However, they’re using other data.
In addition, they claim that the finding of an 88-year cycle in the Nile data is probative of solar involvement … but I find no such 88-year cycle in the solar data.
If anyone has the full Nile dataset, I’m happy to take a look. Until then, it’s just anecdote.
w.
Joe D’Aleo has posted several graphs on Weatherbell that demonstrate a correlation between a longer solar cycle (eleven years is an average) and cooler temperatures and also cooler temperatures and a low AP index. (longer cycles and low AP go together) It costs $20 a month to read Weatherbell. I haven’t learned how to do much beyond type in WordPress. You can’t get to the link below without paying. Personally, I think its worth the money. Lots of good weather and climate information on weatherbell.com.
Joe Bastardi posts there too.
http://www.weatherbell.com/premium/joe-daleo/solar-cycle-24-peak-past—history%20says%20watch%20out%20though%20some-questions-remain/
Timo Niroma produced this graph of sunspot cycle lengths.
http://tallbloke.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/niroma-ss-lengths.jpg?w=921&h=263
@ Alex E. Go to the WUWT Test [page], this will tell you how to do quotes and allow you to test them.
Ted Vaughn says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:55 pm
Either cite the “data/evidence” or go away. That’s just handwaving.
w.
In the Timo Niroma solar cycle graph, note the near absence of an 11 year solar cycle.
I think it is pointless to look at correlations with the 11 year cycle as a sort of smoking gun showing “it’s the sun stupid”. There may be evidence of energy imbalance associated with the 11 solar year cycle, but should this really be expected to show a linear relationship with global temp? The accumulation and release of (solar) energy in the oceans is inherently non-linear. There are imbalances between the tropics and extra-tropics. Between shallow and deep water. Between NH and SH. A 1C anomaly in the tropics will not release energy to the atmosphere at the same rate as 1C extra-tropical anomaly. The mechanisms by which oceans capture solar energy in the mixed layer are somewhat different the mechanisms which release it. Etc.
ren says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:58 pm
As I said above,
w.
Willis,
You can’t see the 100Hz AC if you stick a thermometer in the chicken soup coking on the hot-plate.
This doesn’t mean there is no oscillation of incoming energy, but the thermal inertia is acting as a low-pass filter…..
Also…. 0.5deg Celsius variation is significant for us humans, for our comfort. But looking at it in absolute terms, not much different between 300K or 300.5K ..about as much as in the Sun’s delta TSI ….me think.
(I hope my English is comprehensible enough…. apologize if it’s not, spell check struggle to understand my accent)
Mike Jonas says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:13 pm
Absolutely not. The solar cycles are irregular, and my method detects them quite well. As a result, I am NOT restricting myself to “regular cycles”.
“One should not expect the ~11-year cycle to have a major influence on global temperature, owing to the homoeostatic effect of the two boundaries of the atmosphere: the near-infinite heat-sink that is the ocean and the infinite heat-sink that is outer space. Temperature will only change significantly if there is a sufficiently long period of persistently higher-than-normal solar activity (as there was during most of the past century) or lower-than-normal solar activity.
The significance of the now embarrassingly long period of no-warming over the past 17 years 9 months (RSS), or 13 years 4 months (mean of all five datasets), is that the warming effect from CO2 is insufficient to overcome the cooling effect of declining solar activity (the decline compared with 1960 is the steepest and one of the deepest in the past several hundred years) combined with the negative or cooling phase of the PDO and a recent decline in the Nino/Nina ratio.”
Nicely put, Mr Eschenbach put in his place somewhat.
Honestly there can surely be no other cause of natural variability other than the sun, it, along with axial tilt/proximity cycles can be the only causes of variability once electromagnetic and volcanic earth-based anomalies are discounted as the system is heat driven.
But what do I know, I’m not a climate scientist, Mr Eschenbach it would be extremely helpful if you could respond to Monckton’s assertions and give us an alternative to what drives natural variability.
Cheers
Willis said:
“You see, I reasoned that no matter whether the mechanism making the sun-climate connection were direct variations in the brightness of the sun, or variations in magnetic fields, or variations in UV, or variations in cosmic rays, or variations in the solar wind, they all run in synchronicity with the sunspots.”
Here’s the last 50 years of solar wind speed, can we see the sunspot cycles?
http://snag.gy/r55Lr.jpg
Estimate where they are, then look here to check:
http://snag.gy/5XTIk.jpg
Monckton of Brenchley says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:17 pm
My dear friend Christopher, you are making a terrible mistake. “Nullius In Verba”, as the saying goes … have you actually looked at Herschel’s work?
I ask because have, and it’s not pretty. I suppose I should write up that piece of research as well, so many topics, so little time.
Herschel was guessing based on a very short dataset, and he himself realized that and said so at the time, viz:
I took a look at both the prices Herschel used, and then at the later English grain prices … care to guess what happened to Hershel’s theorized connection once we look at more data?
Yeah, you’re right. It disappears. Gone. Pouf.
Nullius In Verba, old friend, even the verba of William Herschel …
w.
Since my link to the Timo Niroma graph is awaiting moderation due perhaps to the name of the website I took it from. Timo found that the solar cycles peaked at 10.25 years and 11.9 years, with the stronger peak at 10.25, 11 years is a dip, not a peak.
I agree that “it’s the evidence, stupid.” But, it is not the 11-year cycle that is the evidence of interest. the long-term solar cycles, of which we know very little, are the subject of interest, at least to me. They may or may not be regular cycles.
It is well-known that climate gets very cold when the sunspots disappear for decades on end. We have, as far as I know, no proven, accepted causal mechanism why the absence of sunspots causes the Earth to cool. There is the cloud and cosmic ray hypothesis, with cosmic rays modulated by the sun’s magnetic field.
Do we actually need a proven, causal mechanism before it is prudent to act? We can look to the ancient past, when humans had no clue why the sun rose in the East and set in the West. They had no clue why it became cold each winter, but was warm enough to grow crops each summer. They (we believe, at least I believe) figured out the correlation, though. Warm summer equals “plant the crops, and food will grow.” Would it sound silly, to be in a village council meeting thousands of years ago, and argue that we should not plant crops in the Spring because there was no causal mechanism to guarantee the warm summer would follow?
In my May, 2012 speech to the chemical engineers in Southern California, I made the point that we have excellent correlations over hundreds of years that show weak sunspot cycles produce global cooling. In fact, we have evidence that very weak or non-existent sunspot cycles produce extreme cold. The opposite is also true: strong sunspot cycles produce warming, while modest sunspot cycles produce an intermediate temperature.. It is apparent, at least to me, that the late 20th century warming could be attributed to the combined warm ocean cycles with strong sunspot cycles – with no need for CO2 to be considered.
However, with reference to the 11-year sunspot cycle, there is indeed evidence. A 9 to 12 year cycle likely exists in the North Pacific Gyre, as reported by C. A. Perry, where one rotation of the gyre could take approximately 9-12 years. (Perry, Water Resources Division, USGS, Lawrence, Kansas USA). Perry showed that energy from TSI absorbed in the tropical ocean is released after roughly half of the 9-12 years onto the North American continent. My words, not Perry’s, a full cycle of the gyre would be the same as the 11-year sunspot cycle.
http://ks.water.usgs.gov/solar-irradiance-variations-and-regional-precipitations
Perry, C.A., 1994, Solar-Irradiance Variations and Regional Precipitations in the Western United States: International Journal of Climatology, v. 14, November 1994, p. 969-983.
You can’t see a 11yr cycle because your thermoregulatory mechanism irons them out, however just like an air conditioning unit, it only works when excess heat is supplied (summer) when long term lack of heating (maunder minimum) (winter) the AC stops controlling the temperature.
dbstealey says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:25 pm
It’s certainly possible, db … but I’ve seen no sign of a 22-year cycle either. That’s why I ran the analysis from 7 – 25 years, to catch any such cycles.
No catches to date …
w.
Willis, This study ( a guest post at Pielke by Prof Alexander) correlates river flow and sunspot cycles:
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2010/05/20/climate-change-the-west-vs-the-rest-by-will-alexander/
Not saying I subscribe or not, just pointing it out.
Mick says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:59 pm
Thanks, Mick, but I’m not buying that explanation at all. The earth’s temperature swings on the order of 6°C peak to peak over the course of a year. Why would it not respond over an 11-year period?
Or to use your example, it’s as though the chicken soup IS responding to say 3,000 Hz, with a large response, but isn’t responding to the 100 Hz. That’s the puzzle.
w.
My view of this is that the historical record provides sufficient evidence to establish the Sun as the primary driver of climate,. The aggregate of the variations in solar activity over the longer haul are clearly the causative agent, amplified by ocean current variations (themselves an effect of solar activity) and the Earth’s orbital motion, and occasionally affected by volcanism. It is obviously much more complicated than just the 11-year sunspot cycle, but that complexity, with the intermittent non-correlation of some factors to temps does not mean the Sun isn’t the primary driver. It has to be, as the Earth does not emit more energy than it receives from the Sun (unlike the gas giant planets). Details of how the Sun drives climate still need to be worked out, but on a macro level it seems plain that the Sun is the primary force in climate change.
There is no way in hell that CO2 has anything approaching the forcing effect of changes in solar radiation.
The 11-year cycle may or may not have an effect on climate, but HAM radio (1.8MHz to 50MHz) enthusiasts certainly look forward to it.
Ok Willis;
One of the observations over the last few decades is waning sun spots and their magnetic output in the 0.6um band becoming much weaker while the 1.2um band has increased. While this does nothing to Total Solar Irradiance, it does change how the earths atmosphere affects it. At .6um water vapor has little effect yet at 1.2um it has a moderate effect of absorption and scattering,
Now this has not only affected the sunspots themselves but it affects general output for some reason. This would render the 11 year cycle mute, yet if the change in intensity (of differing bands) was large enough could result in cooling, warming, or glaciation. And all without a cycle being present.
Let the beatings begin.. I know they are coming..
Willis Eschenbach in response to J. Peterson: And I still don’t understand how a long, say 60 or 80 year slow small change in the sun’s output could have an effect while a much smaller decadal change doesn’t have an effect. What is the mechanism?
Indeed. No case for a mechanism has yet been supported by much evidence.
Forget about correlation. What is the mechanism by which sun spots would heat the Earth anyway? Otherwise I’m leaning toward the 22 year cycle.
It’s easy to see the solar cycles on earth. For instance, here:
http://www.hindu.com/2010/07/20/stories/2010072053280200.htm
Roger Sowell: It is well-known that climate gets very cold when the sunspots disappear for decades on end. We have, as far as I know, no proven, accepted causal mechanism why the absence of sunspots causes the Earth to cool. There is the cloud and cosmic ray hypothesis, with cosmic rays modulated by the sun’s magnetic field.
Do we actually need a proven, causal mechanism before it is prudent to act?
Act how, and invest how much money, labor and time? Your question is a counterpart to the question that “catastrophists” pose: with as much evidence as we have about CO2, isn’t it prudent to act now?
To me, prudence entails continued research into mechanism, and agricultural research, R&D on all possible sources of energy, and construction of better flood control and irrigation infrastructure. How about you? Shouldn’t “prudence” entail actions that are likely to be effective whether the Earth warms or cools overall?
That’s incidental to Willis’s difficulties in finding 11 and 22 year periods.
Willis, in response to Mick: The earth’s temperature swings on the order of 6°C peak to peak over the course of a year. Why would it not respond over an 11-year period?
Yeh. Why not?
Monckton of Brenchley says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:17 pm
I fear that I’m not seeing the logic in that claim, my friend. Temperatures “change significantly” over the course of a single year. Despite the presence of the “near-infinite heat sinks” of the ocean and outer space, the global temperature changes by 4°C or so over the course of the year. And the hemispheres swing much more than that, 6°C for the southern hemisphere and a 13°C swing for the northern hemisphere.
Since we get those large swings in a single year despite what you call “the homoeostatic effect of the two boundaries of the atmosphere: the near-infinite heat-sink that is the ocean and the infinite heat-sink that is outer space”, why would we not get similar swings from the 11-year solar cycle?
I’m still missing the underlying argument. Here’s the problem as I see it.
The sunspots, along with their allied phenomena (solar wind, TSI, galactic cosmic rays, etc.), vary much, much more during the 11-year cycle than they do over century-long periods.
So … since you claim that there is a big effect from a small change over a century, why would we see absolutely no sign of a much larger change over a decade? That’s the logical jump I can’t figure out.
My best regards to you, as always,
w.
PS—The peak in the recent sunspot activity was around 1960 or so, and it has decreased since then … whereas temperatures have generally risen since then.
???
Well.
There is one plot missing.
The plot that is missing is the day vs night vs temperature. Anywhere on the earth, if it is day,it is warmer than the same place at night which is always colder, all other things being equal.
That temperature spread, shown here for example;
http://www.cita.utoronto.ca/~rjh/adelaide/adelaide-weather-l.html
Indicates what a strong influence solar radiation has and the time constant associated with the radiative effects. Pretty rapid.
The delta T is about 10C in 24 hours.
That is pretty high gain response. Also a pretty short time constant.
A “global warming” if there is one, has to overcome this demonstrable heat cycle. There is no other heat source or sink on that scale.
When there are no alternatives, the improbable must be possible, ergo, the Sun remains.
Willis Eschenbach is too hasty in saying I made a terrible mistake. I reported, correctly, the link between fluctuations in solar activity and grain prices found by Herschel, but went on to say, in terms and with reasons, that one should not expect the 11-year cycle to have much effect on global temperature. The terrible mistake lies in trying to find such an influence given the well-known homeostatic influences on global temperature that are self-evident in the ice-core records.
Per Strandberg (@LittleIceAge) says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:33 pm
Thanks, Per. I said it in the head post. I said it in a prior comment. I will say it again and again until people get it.
The sunspot cycles are indeed not a fixed length … and my method identifies the various cycles despite their variable lengths.
So the objection that the resulting effects on the climate might be of variable length won’t wash. My method will find them anyhow.
In any case, however, what would you propose as a “good” measure of solar activity?
w.
Alex E says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:03 pm
Sunspots are not causing anything and don’t know of anyone who said they were. It is a proxy for the sun’s magnetic activity and not a particularly good one.
Sunspots are a remarkably good proxy for solar magnetism. I just returned from the 4th Sunspot Number Workshop [in Locarno]. Pages 7ff of http://www.leif.org/EOS/Summary_SS4_Stenflo.pdf show a recent analysis,
On the issue of solar influence on climate, I would have to agree with Viscount Monckton and others who have pointed out that the thermoregulatory effect of the oceans would render any attempt to detect an 11 year cycle in temperature a dead end.
Those looking for a instantaneous response to TSI variation would be making the same mistake as climastrologists, ie: claiming that the oceans are a “near blackbody”. When you understand that the oceans are instead a “selective surface” you can see that any solar influence will be slow and long term.
Sunlight does not heat the oceans from the surface, but rather penetrates to depth, with UV-A still having the power of 10 w/m2 at 50m depth. It is the higher frequencies that vary most between solar cycles, and it is UV and SW that heat the oceans with SWIR having little effect and DWLWIR having no effect on ocean temperatures. As some of these SW wavelengths penetrate below the diurnal overturning layer, the oceans can accumulate energy over longer time periods.
The basics of climate on planet ocean are simple –
The sun heats the oceans.
The atmosphere cools the oceans.
Radiative gases cool the atmosphere.
When the correct mechanism of solar heating of the oceans is considered (NOT “near blackbody”), then the idea of searching for an 11 year solar temperature cycle is clearly a dead end.
Willis said
“The sunspots, along with their allied phenomena (solar wind, TSI, galactic cosmic rays, etc.), vary much, much more during the 11-year cycle than they do over century-long periods.”
Major Magentic Storms 1868-2007:
“Although not documented here, it is interesting to note that the overall level of magnetic disturbance from year to year has increased substantially from a low around 1900 Also, the level of mean yearly aa is now much higher so that a year of minimum magnetic disturbances now is typically more disturbed than years at maximum disturbance levels before 1900.”
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/geomag/image/aastar07.jpg
Annual number of magnetic storms:
http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/images/image022.jpg
It seems clear that the strongest influence on temperature on the decadal time scale is ocean oscillations, which could simply be redistributing surface heat in a temporal manner, or they could have their own temperature forcing effects (Tisdale’s theory) so that they create a secular trend. Either way, so long as these effects are stronger in the short run than solar effect they will mask the solar effects unless/until we get solid data on ocean heat content over time. That is the only way to tell in the short run whether solar fluctuations are heating and cooling the climate system and we have only had even the beginnings of this data set for about a decade now.
Without a decent ocean heat content record we can only look at lower frequency surface signals: when solar activity is up for several cycles does it correlate with rising temperatures, and in looking backwards this is what we are stuck with. Here many studies HAVE found quite strong solar-climate correlations. I listed 2 dozen examples in the second section here (“a sample of the omitted evidence“), starting with Bond 2001, “Persistent Solar Influence on North Atlantic Climate During the Holocene,” which found that:
I need to update that list, having since collected several dozen more examples, but I am not the only one collecting this stuff. Club de Soleil, for example, compiled a list of 71 research papers from 2013 alone that reported substantial evidence that climate variation is largely solar driven. The evidence for these lower frequency solar climate variations suggests that the higher frequency correlation must be there too, and must be masked by ocean oscillations.
Willis might also want to think about the possibility that, if there is a mechanism by which solar magnetic activity affects temperature forcings on earth, these mechanisms might alter the temperature setting of the climate system’s built-in thermostatic controls. Suppose, for instance that solar magnetic effects on cloud seeding or on the planet’s electrical circuit slightly alter how readily clouds form? Solar effects and thermostatic mechanisms are not incompatible, but these things are not going to be visible so long as ocean oscillations dominate. The only way to see them is if we can control for oscillations by looking at ocean heat content.
One of my fears is that if the ARGO ocean temperature monitoring system does start to show a falling ocean heat content then the system will be defunded before we can get a good look at this critical variable.
Lord Monckton of Brenchley aptly demonstrated the problem with signal analysis using data with unknown error and uncertainty years back. (I don’t recall the posting maybe His Lordship would kindly post a link? It is a classic problem of S/N ratio. Also if there was warming of 0.1C we still don’t have instruments today that can show that on a planetary scale AND we have no data to compare with that has sufficiently low uncertainty.
So… What % of signal variance for any of the solar plots is necessary to indicate an effect of 0.1C superimposed on a daily cycle of 10 C? Seriously, if it is a small input, then all of your plots lack sufficient precision to indicate the miniscule effect required. Therefore no conclusions can be drawn.
Well. The effect is invisible. Lost in the daily thermal tempest.
Willis: You are aware of Svensmark’s 2007 paper on the correllation (please note, I’m painfully aware that correllation is not causation, per see) between the change in cloud cover, world wide, versus a Forebush decrease (in Cosmic rays, due to a large solar flare). We TRUST you are aware that solar flares and the solar wind act as SHIELDING for the Earth cutting down the number of cosmic rays….and Svensmark’s cosmic ray/cloud seeding hypothesis. (“An Elegant Hypothesis, SLAIN by an UGLY FACT!” Huxley..
Willis, your simple but elegant research must show that the solar variation over the 11-year sunspot cycle is not sufficient (either in magnitude or duration) to trigger a sympathetic variation in earth climate equilibrium.
Put another way…. because the earth climate is not responding to the 11-year sunspot cycle (which we know is creating variable energy output) there must be some equally offsetting effect in the interface between the two systems.
Ulric Lyons says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:02 pm
Major Magnetic Storms 1868-2007:
“Although not documented here, it is interesting to note that the overall level of magnetic disturbance from year to year has increased substantially from a low around 1900
The level today is down to where it was in 1900:
http://www.leif.org/research/Ap-1844-now.png
Temperatures are not.
The Aa index on which your plot was based has a calibration error in 1957.
Not exactly on point but interesting nonetheless. http://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/21/605/2014/npg-21-605-2014.html
DaveR says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:13 pm
Put another way…. because the earth climate is not responding to the 11-year sunspot cycle (which we know is creating variable energy output) there must be some equally offsetting effect in the interface between the two systems.
No, the more likely reason is simply that the variation of the energy output is too small to have any significant effect.
Without any comment:
First things first:
Can anyone show me a planetary time vs AVE temperature plot WITH KNOWN ERROR BANDS for the last 1000 years?
Let us begin there.
Anyone? Crickets?
I know Willis is Anthony’s best mate, and I can tell that he’s a funny, intelligent and entertaining guy because I nearly always read what he writes…but this piece should never have been put up on WUWT. It’s basically opinionated garbage.
lsvallgard says..
No, the more likely reason is simply that the variation of the energy output is too small to have any significant effect…
——————————————————————————————————————–
I agree. That energy variation is not making it into the climate system, whether its too low in the first place, or being offset somewhere, the results is the same.
We know that the variation in solar energy from sunlight angle on the earth’s surface over the earths 1 -year orbit is sufficient to change the weather (=the seasons), but the variation in solar output over the 11-year sunspot cycle is not.
Therefore do we not have a crude upper and lower limit that can point to what the threshold energy variation is the change the climate?
As it may be, however, a simple regression of the tsi averaged over the previous 11 years against the hadcrut data since 1850 will give you a model that “explains” the hadcrut temperatures with an r-squared of 0.61 Since the 11 year average of the tsi is related to the 11 year average of the solar magnetic field, it does appear that the sun enters into things. I conjecture that whatever the physical response of the earth’s temperature field is, it is of a lower frequency than 1 per 11 years. Probably more of 1 per 40 years. D’Aleo also found that the TSI entered his regression model. You can play with this if you get the historical TSI series and the temperature data. For me, that sort of r-squared is sufficient to reject the null hypothesis that the sun has nothing to do with the temperature with some degree of confidence.
Sunspot activity may have an indirect effect via cosmic rays and cloud formation. Looking for a direct effect may not yield results. Look at neutron count data, set a threshold above which cloud formation may become a measure able feedback. Contact me via the wuwt moderators if you would like to get my hobbyist spreadsheet analysis of this Willis.
Leif said:
“The level today is down to where it was in 1900
Temperatures are not.”
It’s hardly as if global mean temperatures would drop back that quickly to 1900 levels after a century of warming. Though regional land temperatures since 2009 have been down to lows not seen since past solar grand minimums.
The mistake every study makes trying to correlate solar effects with climate is that the decouple solar changes from ocean cycles that store and ventilate heat in the tropics. The tropics absorb excess heat then transport it to the extra-tropics, so global trends will be a combination of El Nino, PDO and solar cycles.
Most major climate historical changes show a cosmogenic Be correlation. Such as Solar forcing of Holocene climate: New insights from a speleothem record, southwestern United States
Yemane Asmerom (2007)
In “A decadal solar effect in the tropics in July–August” van Loon and Meehl (2004) found “The large temperature differences between solar maxima and minima in the stratosphere, along with the consistent geographical patterns of tropical rainfall, vertical motion, tropopause temperature, and OLR suggest that the response of the climate system to solar forcing likely consists of a combination of dynamical-radiative air–sea coupling (Meehl et al., 2003), such that increased solar forcing produces higher tropical SSTs (White et al., 1997, 1998), intensified climatological precipitation regimes involving the monsoons and the oceanic precipitation convergence zones, and interactions in the upper stratosphere between ozone and UV that indirectly produce warming of the tropical upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (Shindell et al., 1999; Balachandran et al., 1999).
Wondering if anyone has looked for correlations between solar changes and oceanic current changes. Could variations in proportions of solar energy in shorter wave length bands (shorter than visible ?) be reflected in influence on temperature or ocean current speeds? (Posited solar influence may be difficult to separate from variations in geothermal (volcanoes, “black smokers”) and seismic energy inputs?)
Willis
Is there any correlation between global temperature and the mean of the sunspot numbers in this graph from Wiki ?
Wiki says..There is still a very poor understanding of the correlation between low sunspot activity and cooling temperatures During the period 1645–1715, in the middle of the Little Ice Age, there was a period of low solar activity known as the Maunder Minimum. The Spörer Minimum has also been identified with a significant cooling period between 1460 and 1550. Does this not support
the comment by Mick
Mick says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:59 pm
Willis,
You can’t see the 100Hz AC if you stick a thermometer in the chicken soup [cooking] on the hot-plate.
This doesn’t mean there is no oscillation of incoming energy, but the thermal inertia is acting as a low-pass filter…
And YES I am well aware of the Connolly influence on Wiki…
oops
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sunspot_Numbers.png
Link to Wiki
Test.
Matthew R Marler says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:40 pm
“…Your question is a counterpart to the question that “catastrophists” pose: with as much evidence as we have about CO2, isn’t it prudent to act now?”
I feel that is not an accurate reading of Roger Sowell’s original assertion;
“Do we actually need a proven, causal mechanism before it is prudent to act?”.
His example was based on observed and very regular occurrences that had/have therefore high (approaching 1) probability of being repeated. His point is only that you don’t need to know why before concluding that it will happen again.
The “catastrophists” have no such basis for their call to arms. (or if they have they are keeping it to themselves). Based on observation there is very low (and decreasing) probability, in a “business as usual” scenario, of man-made climate change that is beyond our ability to adapt.
I do however support the so called precautionary principle as long as it is applied to the recommended action as conscientiously as to the original trigger.
In other words; if you have concluded that it is prudent to act now, examine and explain (and thereby understand) – step by step – how your recommended action a) will produce the desired result and b) will not risk “side effects” that are potentially as or more damaging than the initial perceived problem.
“Doing something” just for the sake of it is rarely prudent. On that I think we would agree.
Leif said
“The Aa index on which your plot was based has a calibration error in 1957.”
It still seems to show a doubling of aa index days >=60 up to 1950:
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/geomag/image/aastar07.jpg
The annual number of storms shows a very similar pattern:
http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/images/image022.jpg
The various satellite measurements of TSI, which span something like three 11 year sunspot (half) cycles, suggest a 0.1% cyclic variation in TSI (roughly).
Well whoop de doo !.
As Leif has pointed out many times, if that were simply transformed via the Stefan-Boltzmann formula, into some supposedly “equilibrium” BB Temperature shift, that converts to about 72mdeg. C. Whoop de do again. Not enough to show up, even if that was a good theory, also given the annual cyclic change in SI. So nyet on TSI of known variations.
BUT ! back to a recent (not so long ago) Willis essay, on some observations of a Volcanic dimming incident(s) I believe made in Hawaii (shoot me if I’m wrong Willis) where for some months, there was a measured, very significant reduction (20-25% sticks in my mind) in the SURFACE solar irradiance; that decayed exponentially over a few months to a year or so (in that region) BUT, the local temperature anomalies showed no observable temperature change at all (in that region.
It was a striking demonstration that the weather / climate feedback loop, can squelch a host of solar irradiance variation, that happens over time intervals, that are clearly much longer than the thermal time constants.
Well the day night temperature cycle proves that the thermal response can be pretty darn fast, compared to a three month SI deprivation.
So that essay of yours Willis proved to me quite solidly, that there is a very active negative feedback, temperature regulating loop in play.
I don’t know how many times I have alluded to it, over the years; and Dr Roy, has put the stamp of academic respectability to it himself.
It’s called ….”””” CLOUDS “”””….
So the plasticine modelers keep saying they don’t understand how to model clouds (and they don’t).
So while I firmly believe the sun is the slightly variable power supply, that powers this inhabited wet rock; I would never expect to find the noisiness of that power supply to be able to overcome the more powerful regulatory processes of our oceans; due to our oceans consisting mostly of H2O molecules in the mostly liquid phase.
Dr Roy pegged it Willis, so give yourself a break, and save yourself the trouble of looking for a sun link.
Well, unless it suddenly goes out. And Willis, you know the heads down pose for dealing with the sun suddenly going out !
This post is one of the most silly I’ve seen in a long time. I don’t remember anyone saying that the 11 years cycles have enough change in radiation to produce an effect that isn’t masked by the planetary climate system. It has always been successive low cycles like the Mauder minimum. And even if the cycles aren’t readily visible, they are known to exist. They are there. So a better question to ask is how does the planetary climate system counter these changes in solar input so that we may understand if part of the “signal” is not masked causing some of the changes we’re seeing. I don’t think there exists much research in discerning the solar input signal from an attenuated system.
“Unfortunately, the dang facts got in the way again”
They often do. I’ve told you before,you should leave those things alone and stick to pure speculation.
Willis,
As always, lots of interesting food for thought in your post!
Willis Eschenbach says:
Okay, so…Now, you have identified a clear test of the dominant paradigm, but you haven’t gone as far as I think you could in putting your hypothesis versus the paradigm to the test. Why don’t you look and see if climate models forced with the changes in solar luminosity over the sunspot cycles show a strong response?
If you do see a significant response in the models but not in the real data, then it seems to me that you have a real potential challenge to the paradigm. If not, you are sort of attacking a strawman because if the models don’t predict a strong response, then the lack of a strong response hasn’t really provided any evidence against the paradigm.
If it isn’t Sun cycles that cause changes to the climate, what other causes could there be?
Astronomers say we are currently located inside a low-density zone that is about 10 times lower in neutral atoms than the average of 0.5 atoms/cc elsewhere in the Milky Way on average. So what effect would there be if the solar system passed through a denser medium, such as an interstellar cloud? Could a higher-density zone block some sunlight from reaching Earth or have some other effect?
After a search, I found the following comment at http://www.astronomycafe.net/qadir/q1372.html:
“When the solar system enters such a cloud, the first thing that will happen will be that the magnetic field of the Sun, which now extends perhaps 100 AU from the Sun and 2-3 times the orbit of Pluto, will be compressed back into the inner solar system depending on the density of the medium that the Sun encounters. When this happens, the Earth may be laid bare to an increased cosmic ray bombardment.”
Could passing through a cosmic dust cloud have caused ice ages in the past? If increased cosmic rays cause more clouds, couldn’t that cause cooling and possibly account for past ice ages? I have no idea one way or the other. I’m just throwing it out there because I haven’t seen any mention of such a possibility.
Willis,
Spot the science error
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/01/spot-the-science-error/
Oh, I made a mistake. I thought Willis was completely aware of the Sunspot/Solar Wind/Cosmic ray connection. The “Cloud” experiments by CERN, the experiments with CLOUD CHAMBERS by Svensmark in his own lab, and the commensurate caculative basis, of course the MARVELOUS paper by Svensmark (http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/svensmark-forebush.pdf), AND the rather large number of other “correlative” work…which has been rather well laid out in the comments. If, dear…brillant and determined Willis,you are looking for some TSI/solar output, “direct” correlation between sunspots and the Earth’s weather, no…I would not claim there is one nore expect to find one. In point of fact, if you did….this would be of interest.
Willis, you can’t see the forest for the trees. If you look at the graph you presented here:
[deleted on submitter’s request]
Each 11+or- cycle (each one is a “tree”) doesn’t have an immediate effect, but the “forest” or grouping of them does. (at least for the last almost 300 years) (and well, if 3 to 5 makes a forest) Maybe the 3 warm periods and 2 cool periods shown are just a coincidence. Are there registered sunspot numbers that go back further in time, along with accurate temp records?
Oh great!!! my clipboard didn’t work – lol here’s the link I meant to attach:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/05/24/its-the-evidence-stupid/#comment-1645032
Sorry – mod can you delete that video??
Willis
Maybe you need to identify the natural frequency of the atmosphere oceanic system. If you drive a system at or near the natural frequency, you get noticeably responses. But if the earth’s climate system has a natural frequency of 3 or 55 years (strictly random suggestions) you won’t detect an obvious signal if driven by a forcing with an 11 year cycle. It will take much longer to show up. Thermal systems have very slow response times, especially those dominated by liquids like the Earths oceans.
Bill
Like my old boss said – you know just enough about the computer to be dangerous…
I wouldn’t expect to find any change reflecting the short 11 year cycle for a couple of reasons. First is that the solar radiation does not change enough for it to mean much. Secondly, it would be the lull between the cycles, not the peaks that would result in change and they are too short, generally, to show up. However, when one has a grand minimum, it might, because of the increase in GCRs over a much longer period of time.
In other words, I believe it takes several years of reduced solar activity to show up in the record, not just a year or two. I also believe that difference has to be over an extended period of time. A decade or more.
R. de Haan,
Thanks for the link. Is discussion about Piers Corbyn forbidden on WUWT now?
Hydrology & Hale Cycle
WJR Alexander finds that hydrology in Southern African region is driven by the ~ 22 year Hale Cycle, but not evaporation. See:
WJR Alexander et al., Linkages between solar activity, climate predictability and water resource development Journal of the South African Institution of Civil Engineering Vol 49 No 2, June 2007, Pages 32–44, Paper 659
WJR Alexander & F. Bailey, Solar Activity and Climate Change – A Summary, Journal Energy & Environment Volume 18, Number 6 / November 2007 10.1260/095830507782088749
Alexander offers his entire life long collection of all hydrological records in the Southern African region to anyone who asks: WJR Alexander, Professor Emeritus, Department of Civil and Biosystems Engineering, University of Pretoria Email: alexwjr@iafrica.com
Your 4 long term atmospheric pressure stations are all in the tropics or close to the tropics.
Can you see the signal you are looking for if you choose places that are say 50-70N or S (where atmospheric pressure varies over a much bigger range)?
The earth is a low-pass filter with a cutoff frequency around 29 years.
Willis, many years ago I heard that sunspots correlate with vintage. Allegedly, the wine is better in years with lots of sunspots. You might find the cycle there. If you can get a generous research grant, I will be very happy to help you with the requisite research.
george e. smith says:
Well, it might prove it to you but it certainly doesn’t to me. I can think of a ton of issues with such a test. One is the huge thermal heat capacities involved…Places like Hawaii don’t have that strong a diurnal temperature cycle as is true of more continental climates. A second issue is the neglect of the fact that climate is far from a local effect, that is there is huge heat transport around the globe. You can’t just say, “Forcing is reduced here so it should be a lot colder here.” A third is you have to figure out the extent to which that change in solar radiation reaching the surface means less solar radiation being absorbed vs the extent to which some of that radiation that didn’t reach the surface was absorbed in the atmosphere (i.e., to what extent do the volcanic aerosols reflect radiation and to what extent do they block it by absorbing it).
But, another important thing is that you are making a big confusion between changes in forcing at the surface and top-of-the-atmosphere forcings. The book “Global Warming: The Hard Science” by L.D. Harvey has a nice calculation demonstrating how a large change in forcing at the surface will result in only a small temperature change (essentially because it is canceled out by changes in convection) while the same change in top-of-the-atmosphere forcing has a much larger effect because it involves the energy budget of the entire system and can’t just be counteracted by a change in convection.
Again, this is the sort of thing that could become a useful test if you actually used it to compare the response of the real world to the response of a climate model and showed that the real world behaved one way (suggesting the forcing didn’t have much effect) but the climate model behaved a different way (suggesting the forcing did have a strong effect). Then you would at least have some possible evidence that the climate models are overestimating the effect of the forcing.
Without this, you would again just be attacking strawmen, i.e., you would be claiming, “If the climate system worked in the way climate scientists claim it does then I would expect to see something different than what I saw” but without providing any evidence whatsoever to support the “I would expect to see something different” part of the claim.
Just because you can’t find an eleven year cycle in the climate doesn’t mean that the sun doesn’t affect the climate.
Others have pointed out that long periods of low or high solar activity do seem to have an effect. Judith Curry points out work by: Svensmark, Vahrenholt and Luning, and the NRC. http://judithcurry.com/2013/10/01/ipcc-solar-variations-dont-matter/
Here’s a quote from a NASA press release describing the NRC report:
lsvalgaard says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:16 pm
Ulric Lyons says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:02 pm
Major Magnetic Storms 1868-2007:
“Although not documented here, it is interesting to note that the overall level of magnetic disturbance from year to year has increased substantially from a low around 1900
The level today is down to where it was in 1900:
http://www.leif.org/research/Ap-1844-now.png
Temperatures are not.
___________________________________________
The temperatures in 1900 were proceeded by 2 consecutive low solar cycles.
If Earth experiences 3 consecutive low solar cycles like the current one, Earth temps will be lower too..
http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/images/image022.jpg
@ Matthew R Marler on May 24, 2014 at 4:40 pm
Your question to me is:
“Act how, and invest how much money, labor and time?”
My own view of the overall problem is that global cooling is the greater problem, and is imminently upon us. Man-made Global Warming is a myth based on very bad science and agenda-driven people. One of my most-viewed blog posts is of the speech I make on this. see Part III, Implications of this link:
http://sowellslawblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/warmists-are-wrong-cooling-is-coming.html
What we could, and should do as “acts” include preparing for a much, much colder climate for decades on end. Much of the northern hemisphere’s infrastructure is not suited to prolonged cold.
In some respects, the climate cooling crisis will be sudden, and we will not have much time to prepare. In other respects it will be slow. The sudden aspect will be crop failures. The world has very little stored food and will be in crisis mode in roughly one year after the first major crop failure. Political upheaval will occur as hungry people act in violent ways. Medical treatment will be in short supply.
Slower aspects will be the need for more heating energy and improved transportation routes. Displaced populations from inhospitable colder climates to warmer areas will create massive shortages of housing, water, and other basic needs.
However, possibly the greatest danger and need for an “act” is preparing nuclear power plants from damage by floods and ice floes in the flood waters. This is an overlooked but very grim outcome of a sudden colder climate. The NRC has identified numerous nuclear plants that are downstream of dams that could have severe damage if the dam breaks. The risk assessment is low, in their opinion. However, ice dams on rivers also pose serious danger to nuclear plants downstream. When the ice dam breaks, great damage is done by the flood waters and ice. I have not found any NRC analysis of this danger.
:-}
Max Hugoson says:
May 24, 2014 at 6:42 pm
Not sure of your point there, Max. Since cosmic rays run in synchrony with sunspots, and since there is definitely a sunspot/solar wind/cosmic ray connection, and since all of those phenomena run in parallel with the 11-year sunspot cycle … given all that, just why should we NOT expect to find the 11-year cosmic ray/solar wind/sunspot cycle somewhere in the climate datasets?
w.
Charles Nelson says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:39 pm
Charles, I’ve provided lots and lots of math, data, computer code, logic, citations, and support for my ideas and claims.
You, on the other hand, have provided … well, nothing but your opinion. You haven’t even had the balls to quote what you disagree with, you just wave your hands and give us your oh-so-valuable opinion …
I know which one I call “opinionated garbage”. Come back when you can actually find and point out something wrong with my work.
Or not, I don’t care …
w.
Willis, perhaps a better explanation would be, “It’s the sunspots and PDO cycles, stupid”…
Over the past 163 years, there is a 100% correlation between 30-yr PDO warm/cool cycles and global temperature trends:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1850/to:1880/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1850/to:1880/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1881/to:1921/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1881/to:1921/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1922/to:1943/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1922/to:1943/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1944/to:1976/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1944/to:1976/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1977/to:2004/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1977/to:2004/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2005/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2005/trend
The strongest 63-year string of sunspot activity in 11,400 years occurred from 1933~1996 (Solanki et al) which matches the general 20th century global warming trend:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1933/to:1996/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1933/to:1996/trend
When the strongest 63-yr string of solar cycles in 11,400 years ended in 1996, so did the global warming trend:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1996.5/plot/rss/from:1996.5/trend/plot/esrl-co2/from:1996.5/normalise/trend/plot/esrl-co2/from:1996.5/normalise
If you superimpose the PDO warm/cool cycles over the sunspot cycles, the cool PDO cycles tend to negate/overwhelm the positive forcing effects of sunspots, while the warm PDO cycles tend to accentuate the sunspot positive forcing during strong solar cycles.
We also know that during the Little Ice Age (1280~1850) there were 4 Grand Solar Minimums (Wolf, Sporer, Maunder and Dalton), which likely explains why we had a Little Ice Age.
When the Wolf Grand Solar Minimum stated, the LIA started and when the Dalton Grand Solar Minimum ended, the LIA ended soon afterwards. During the end of the Wolf GSM (1280~1350), roughly 25% of Europeans died from famine and extreme cold.
Of course there isn’t a perfect fit between any single climate variable as nature is always fighting to find equilibrium. That’s why CAGW’s CO2 “tipping point” hypothesis doesn’t work (and as our very existence proves). Nature always tends to find a way to offset swings in either extreme, but she isn’t always successful, especially during long/cold Milankovitch cycles, which overwhelms the Earth’s energy budget for 10’s of thousands of years.
It’s all about entropy and the amazing and beautiful dance between time and energy… Unfortunately, CAGW has been disco dancing to the tune of CO2 for far too long and they look absolutely hilarious in their lime-green polyester leisure suits, and their music sucks.
We need more Mozart and less Bee Gees…
Keep up with your excellent posts, Willis! I always enjoy them as they make people think and question their assumptions.
Willis have you looked in to daily wind run readings over the 11 year cycle?.
I have but only started this using my weather station readings almost 4 years.
IE for Februarys avg per day. 2011=181.99km. 2012=194.41km. 2013=216.85km. 2014=218.11km.
And in Mays 2011=144.78km. 2012=150.28km. 2013=159.94km. 2014=165.75km per day.
Just a thought..
I read about 2/3 of the comments, and from the information in Willis’ post and the comments, it is my belief that you will never find a suitable “cycle.
In the first place, the sunspot cycle is not ~11 years, but varies considerably according to the graphs in the post.
Secondly, temperature, pressure, rainfall each have their own cycles.
Without getting any further involved, simply combining the additive effects of the cycles noted would result in a relatively chaotic overall “cycle”.
Even if powerful computing equipment could determine a cycle, daily changes in something as simple as construction activity would alter the computed “cycle”.
Over geologic time, the extremes of change in thins such as [plate] tectonics, sea level rise/fall, changes in ocean area and volcanism would ruin the most complex computations that could be imagined.
It is my opinion that the problem Willis encountered is essentially analogous to peeling an onion, albeit a very big one: as more is learned, there is even more that remains to be learned if one is to ever solve the puzzle.
I’m thinking thermostat effect. The sun’s activity has to remain elevated or depressed for some time before the increase or decrease triggers global warming or cooling. Kind of like the formation of thunderstorms and how they might continue even though the temperature has dropped below the level necessary to trigger a thunderstorm?
Willis
Your posts are always thought provoking, which I appreciate. Even the non-scientific ones.
I have three questions:
1. Isn’t the information always in the modulation rather than the carrier, regardless of the frequency of the carrier? There seems to be both amplitude and frequency modulation going on with the 11 year sunspot cycle. Perhaps the pertinent information is in the area under the curve (average power), rather than the peak of the signal.
2 I realize there is a very long record of sunspot activity, but is the number of visible sunspots really a good proxy for how much of the EME’s hit the earth? Of the sunspots that are counted, very few are pointed directly at us. The Earth is a very tiny target for the sun, so perhaps we should only be concerned about those that impact the earth.
3. What is required is how warm is the earth at any given moment. ignoring the “adjustments”, UHI and siting issues, is air temperature the best indicator of that? Is it appropriate to derive an average air temperature from min/max temperatures?
Had the article author been a real scientist, he would have understood that his arguments are as valid as the wellknown usage of valid but in sound fallacies proving the moon to be a cheese He would have known but that that doesn’t make a conclusion true. In other words arguments can one by one can be valid, but only if the premises for the arguments are sound it’s possible to draw conclusion . If not than reality wins over fiction.
If an argument is valid and its premises are true, the argument is sound. If an argument is not sound it is unsound. An argument can be valid even if its premises are false—but such an argument is unsound. For instance, the following argument is valid but unsound:
Cheese more than a billion years old is stale. The Moon is made of cheese. The Moon is more than a billion years old. Therefore, the Moon is stale cheese.
If all three premises were true, the conclusion would have to be true. The argument is valid despite the fact that the Moon is not made of cheese, but the argument is unsound—because the Moon is not made of cheese. Chapter 16, Propositional Logic, discusses validity and soundness in more detail.
The logical form of the argument just above is (roughly):
For any x, if x is A and x is B then x is C. y is A. y is B. Therefore, y is C. [+]
…….
An argument consists of a sequence of statements. One is the conclusion; the rest are premises. The premises are given as evidence that the conclusion is true. If the conclusion must be true if the premises were true, the argument is valid. A valid argument is sound if its premises are true. Valid arguments result from applying correct rules of reasoning. Examples of correct rules of reasoning include:
• A or not A.
• Not (A and not A).
• A. B. Therefore, A and B.
• A. Therefore, A or B.
• A and B. Therefore, A.
• A or B. Not A. Therefore, B.
• Not A. Therefore, not (A and B).
• Not (A and B). Therefore, (not A) or (not B).
• Not (A or B). Therefore, (not A) and (not B).
• If A then B. A. Therefore, B.
• If A then B. Not B. Therefore, not A.
Validity and soundness, Valid rules of reasoning paragraph in Chapter 2 Reasoning and Fallacies, stat.berkeley.edu
Some people calling themself scholars must have been asleep during Theories of Science lessons…….
I’m with Alec here. The sun is not heating the wheat in England or the rain in Spain. It is not heating the Nile (very much). It is heating the ocean and the land. The land pretty much blows it off the next night. The ocean stores it for…the ENSO cycle, the AMO cycle, maybe the PDO cycle. The net effect is that always the ocean heats the atmosphere somewhere, sometime with varying lags and spatial distribution.
I’ve been in Maui a few days pondering the trades wrecking havoc with a southwest swell. When we take a typical graph of an oscillation it is essentially one dimensional with time. So we are really in a four dimensional realm and only two are represented in the graph. We are trying to deconstruct a 4d signal from an unknown number of components in 2d.
What the trades are doing is introducing a chop with a much higher frequency than the southwest swell. The incidence is maybe 45 degrees north of the swell. Occasionally a large wave comes along that seems to be at an average of the competing angles.
You are right as far as you go. All we can do is watch and learn.
The solar magnetic cycle most certainly modulates planetary climate and we are going to have a front row seat to watch the cooling phase of a Dansgaard-Oeschger cycle. Willis you are plotting the wrong variables.
GCR at high latitudes is modulated by the solar heliosphere strength, extent, and density which lags sunspot count by two or three years.
Planetary cloud cover at high latitudes increases when GCR is high and decreases when GCR is low however as noted below solar wind bursts over ride GCR and can therefore if the solar wind bursts occur at solar minimum which they have make it appear the that GCR does not modulate planetary cloud cover.
Solar wind bursts (not the speed of the solar wind but rather the change in the speed of the solar wind) creates a space charge differential in the ionosphere which in turn removes cloud forming ions. The solar wind bursts are caused by both sunspots and low latitude solar coronal holes which last for two or three solar rotations. The coronal holes have for some unknown reason (the cause of coronal holes is not understood) been appearing in low latitude regions of the sun at the end of solar cycles which creates solar wind bursts.
The solar wind bursts by the process called electroscavenging remove ions from both high latitude regions and equatorial regions. Even when GCR is high if there are high solar wind bursts the GCR created ions are removed which causes a reduction in cloud cover in high latitude regions. The solar wind bursts late in the solar cycle make it appear that changes to GCR do not affect high latitude planetary cloud cover.
The change in charge caused by the solar wind bursts at the equator changes the number and size of droplets in the clouds which in turn changes the amount of upward long wave radiation that absorbed by the clouds. This mechanism amplifies El Niño and La Niña events.
As noted in the AGU conference Oct, 2013 the solar heliosphere density has reduced by approximately 40%. The reduction in the density of the solar heliosphere density has reduced the magnetic field intensity of the solar wind bursts. The solar wind bursts relative strength is measured by how much they effect the geomagnetic field in a three hour period (Ap). As noted it the short term change in the solar wind speed that controls how large the affect is (in addition the magnetic field strength of the wind burst itself.)
There is a fundamental error concerning the solar model which is the physical reason why the GCR mechanism has been inhibited for roughly 7 years. The fundamental error when corrected will have a profound effect on both cosmology, climatology, and geophysics. I will explain the details of this issue when there is unequivocal cooling.
This graph shows GCR at high a high latitude region. As the graph shows the GCR level is very high.
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/webform/query.cgi?startday=27&startmonth=03&startyear=1975&starttime=00%3A00&endday=27&endmonth=04&endyear=2014&endtime=00%3A00&resolution=Automatic+choice&picture=on
Persistent solar signatures in cloud cover: spatial and temporal analysis
Voiculescu & Usoskin 2012
“We have analyzed the coherence between the time variations of two solar proxy drivers, cosmic ray ionization and UV irradiance, on one hand, and low, middle and high clouds, on the other hand, in order to check the persistence of solar signal in cloud cover between 1984 and 2009. Coherence plaots show that for most of the selected regions cloud type varies in phase or anti-phase with solar activity, depending on cloud type and geographical region. The area where the confidence level is greater than 95% is large in many of the coherence plots, which can hardly be a random coincidence.”
Sounds like a heat transport effect to me but that’s just a guess. Don’t count solar out yet.
It seems to me that if I wanted to look for the signature of the eleven-year solar cycle in some other climate data, I would focus on high resolution and low noise data like atmospheric CO2. I would ask questions like: Does the magnitude of the seasonal fluctuation change at all on an 11-year cycle? I’m not a climate scientist, but it seems to me like the temperature records and other climate data are way too noisy to be able to find a tiny contribution from the solar cycle.
Solar power is a constant and large source of energy for the earth, so changes to climate will not be easy to measure. It seems unlikely that an 11 year cycle will be seen in any length of climate record due to the fact that noise in the system will be higher than the overall effect. the 11 year cycle is most likely modulating longer term cycles such as ENSO,PDO or AMO etc eg-
http://www.nature.com/ncomms/journal/v2/n2/full/ncomms1186.html
the spectrogram in that (fig 5) shows an approx 60yr cycle which would fit.
the point is though that I never thought i would read this- “So no matter the mechanism, it would have a visible ~11-year heartbeat.” from willis. I just dont understand how one goes from the questioning to the assertive with so little actually known about the ‘mechanisms’ and how the sun affects our climate.
the only real evidence that stands up so far is that changes in the solar energy reaching the earth (in some form or another) directly affect our climate in relatively short periods of time (hundreds of years). it is up to us to find the hows and whys, not just declare that it cant be the sun, stupid!
Color me stupid, but why, Willis, are you using atmospheric pressure records instead of atmospheric temperature records?
William Astley says:
May 24, 2014 at 9:36 pm
The solar wind bursts relative strength is measured by how much they effect the geomagnetic field in a three hour period (Ap).
Apart from yuor musings being incorrect, e.g. as shown by the direct observations of Ap shows both a solar cycle and the lack of any trend over the last 170 years http://www.leif.org/research/Ap-1844-now.png
Yep, can’t see any reason why you’d use atmospheric pressure records instead of temperature records. Care to redo with the proper sort of records?
Willis, how come dependent on the orbit and angle towards the sun, do we get season? Sunspots do have a degree of influence on rain and cloud formation. I see where you are coming from. Earth reflects heat into the lower atmosphere, UHI, but without clouds the heat is no kept down under then. See how deserts are hot during day and freezing during the night without clouds. And of course all living organisms can get sunburned.
I have no idea what your “periodogram” is, but the “11 year” cycle in it is rather small.
Why?
The 200 year period in your “periodogram” – whatever it is – is evidently much more powerful (integral under the curve).
I´d expect the climate responses to the 200 year cycle, rather than to the 11 year artefact.
alex says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:13 pm
I´d expect the climate responses to the 200 year cycle, rather than to the 11 year artefact.
So compare the climate now with that of 200 years ago…
I am out of town and away from my computer but I always thought this was an interesting correlation
http://climatechange.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=003801
Willis says….”Why The 11-year Cycle?: Because it is the biggest cycle” and ….
“The earth’s temperature swings on the order of 6°C peak to peak over the course of a year. Why would it not respond over an 11-year period?”
I think you may be incorrect on both counts. We may not know what the biggest solar cycle is.
The 11 year period may not be of adequate length to measure an input that may take far longer to manifest in the atmosphere, and may last far longer then 11 years.
In my view the money quote in Monckton’s post was this…”One should not expect the ~11-year cycle to have a major influence on global temperature, owing to the homoeostatic effect of the two boundaries of the atmosphere: the near-infinite heat-sink that is the ocean and the infinite heat-sink that is outer space. Temperature will only change significantly if there is a sufficiently long period of persistently higher-than-normal solar activity (as there was during most of the past century) or lower-than-normal solar activity”
The GHE works on the principle of increasing the residence time of radiant energy in the earth’s atmosphere. (Some of the Energy that would normally escape to space via radiation is instead redirected back towards the surface, or is conducted to from additional GHG molecules to non GHG molecules.) While this energy stays longer, additional energy enters, thus more energy = warming. Basically warming or cooling comes down to the residence time of the energies involved.
In order to determine where to look for a solar affect on climate, it would be wise to know the residence times of disparate solar spectrum. Some of the solar energy can penetrate up to 800′ in the deep oceans. The residence time of solar energy is dependent on the wavelength of said radiant energy, and the materials it encounters. Some of that energy may well stay within the oceans for decades, or centuries. As such it may take decades or centuries to reach the atmosphere in order to manifest as a GAT.
Also remember it is competing with dozens of other GAT factors, all changing on different time scales, some cyclical, some not, but definitively existing within an inherently chaotic system. As such we may not be capable of determining one affect as, due to different factors rarely repeating on the same scale and cycle, any one affect may not manifest in the same way each time.
Willis, this rational approach of yours is only going to upset most of the followers of this site.
LT says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:22 pm
I am out of town and away from my computer but I always thought this was an interesting correlation
http://climatechange.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=003801
==================================================================
It is interesting. As the Arctic atmosphere is composed of much lower energy then the tropics, it is logical to think it may be more sensitive to solar input. (Although I tend to think it is very sensitive to ocean currents.)
What is the arctic T based on in this chart?
In reading the above comments I notice many contrasting views, some showing support for different complicates aspects of solar factors, some showing inconsistency, much like Willis has showed with the projected volcanic affect, much like skeptics show with CO2, much like can be found with any one factor competing in a soup of different ingredients.
It is possible that major shifts in climate (other then those caused by one off or extinction events) mainly occur only when several strong factors all come together in harmonic resonance.
Willis: “So no matter the mechanism, it would have a visible ~11-year heartbeat.”
You need to look at 94-year trend to look earth’s response to the climate. 11-years is two short for the earth’s ocean to respond to the sun spot variation.
Charles Nelson says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:39 pm
Normally I wouldn’t do this but Mr Eschenbach has attempted to slight me by saying my lake level graph is hilarious. Well, it is someone else’s graph in the first instance. As for the evidence provided by that graph, as the Bible says “There are none so blind as those who will not see.” Mr Eschenbach has not been able to determine the physical basis of the Sun – climate relationship. In his mind, if he can’t do it, then it doesn’t exist. Also in his mind, that means that others who have provided evidence for the relationship are wrong, and fools for even attempting. But why, you would then ask yourself, did he feel compelled to go on the public record with this “garbage” post? A post which betrays a refusal to accept scientific reality in the form of the papers of Solheim et al, amongst hundreds of others?
lsvalgaard says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:16 pm
So compare the climate now with that of 200 years ago…
……………..
Yes, but the problem is we have only 400 years of direct sunspot observations and only 100 years of relatively good temperature measurements. This is barely too small to compare.
Anyway, any theory must have a predictive value. This means, we have to wait for another 1000 years or so…
David,
Forgive me I’m doing this from my iPhone and I can’t read the paper to find the source of the Arctic temperature but I believe this is the paper that the graph was lifted from
http://www.oism.org/pproject/GWReview_OISM150.pdf
Willis about 1990 I was on my schooner about 80 miles from la pas in baja the substellar point of a eclipse of the sun, it took about six minutes. My grandchilderen were with me, so I got them to measure the temperature change. As I recall we lost about 20 degrees F starting from about F. The birds settled down and the fish begain jumping. I would estimate the temperature fall to be around120 Degrees in say about 4Hr. Anyone saying the sun does not change the earths temperuature needs to spend a year above 60N or S by the following February or August they would have better understanding of weather.
From norah4you on May 24, 2014 at 9:24 pm:
At this point I may freely disregard the further scribblings of the comment author as a guano-infused appeal to authority, without merit.
Especially as since we are inundated with CAGW-hyping articles by “climate scientists” who clearly do not act as real scientists, the job title “scientist” bears far less of a correlation with actual performance as a real scientist when climate is involved.
The article author has published in peer-reviewed journals and has extensive experience in data analysis, often climate related, and is self-taught remarkably well. What are the comment author’s qualifications that enable and justify their complaining about his qualifications?
The solar cycle is not a perfect cycle. There are many causes that influence climate. Most of them are not perfect cycles or not cycles at all. The climate system is not linear. It’s quite hard to identify a ‘signature’ from the output.
Even what the ‘science’ does the ‘best’:
Effects(human_causes + natural_causes) = Effects(human_causes) + Effects(natural_causes)
is very wrong, because it assumes linearity where there isn’t.
If you draw a figure of the sun spots and the dates of the 11 cities skating race in Friesland, Holland, you WILL find a convincing graph for the sun spot cycle.
@Willis Eschenbach: Did you consider the 10-15 years of lag between changes of sun activity and climate? Did you consider other natural influences like AMO and PDO (and its positive/negative feedbacks like El Nino or the melting Arctic) which can easily change climate by up to a half degree Celsius independent of the actual sun activity? Guess not. Because There would be at least a small correlation between sun activity and climate if these factors are considered (trust me, I check the climate data and facts every day for more than 5 years, I know what I’m talking about).
By all respect, please check all possible facts before contradicting the solar influence on climate. The climate is very, very complex. It’s easy to tell somebody that a certain climate influence doesn’t exist, but it is hard to prove a climate influence because you have to correct ALL other influences first to be able to get the proof of the influence factor on our climate.
Piers Corbyn does long range weather prediction based on the solar magnetic field and weather records. Video here:
http://classicalvalues.com/2014/05/follow-the-evidence/
Let us assume, our climate is an oscillator with the eigenfrequency w0.
d^2T/dt^2 + w0^2*T = forcing
The solar forcing has two driving harmonics 11 years and 200 years.
Let us assume the eigenfrequency w0 is about 30 years (inverse).
Then the response to the 11 years forcing is
dT11 ~ forcing11/(w11)^2
the response to the 200 years forcing is
dT200 ~ forcing200/(w0)^2.
So that assuming the same forcing200 and forcing11 (that is not the case!), the relative temperature response is
dT11/dT200 = (w200/w11)^2 = (11/200)^2 = 0.003
According to his “periodogramm”, the 200 year period forcing is at least an order of magnitude stronger than that at 11 years. So that in reality
dT11/dT200 ~ 0.0001.
We estimate that dT200 is about 1 degree Celsius.
That means, the climate response to the 11 year cycle must be somewhere around 1e-4 degree.
You want to measure 0.0001 degree signal?
Don’t be silly.
Moderators: what did I say that got my message bounced?
[Nothing obvious, it was just waiting. .mod]
The problem with trying to directly correlate sunspots cycles with climate is that during each cycle when the sunspots go to 0, the value of tsi, AP index or neutron rates is not relative to prior sunspot cycles when sunspot counts are low. That is why cycle length or some other conversion of the proxy must be used to correlate with climate.
What I do here is quite simple, but people do tend to throw around terms of spectrum, envelope, and modulations without conviction and/or in erroneous ways. Here I was struck by the 11 vs. 22 year cycle as reminiscent of the well known (but often with a misunderstood 2:1 error) beating in mistuned musical instruments.
The possibility that a periodicity might be 11 years; or it might be 22 years with a “sign reversal” of some sort, leads to a comparison to a musical analog of beating, and then to amplitude modulation and “balanced modulation” (double sideband or just a multiplication). I don’t think for a moment that these lead to much insight regarding solar cycles, but even in the musical cases things can be misleading.
We understand that if one trumpet (for example) is playing A=440 Hz while a second trumpet is mistuned and is playing 442 Hz, that there is a “beating” at the difference frequency, which is 2 Hz, or two beat per second. Every musician believes this. To show this we might try:
Sin(A) + Sin(B) = 2 Sin[ (A+B) / 2] Cos[ (A-B) / 2 ]
Now we have a problem! This shows an average frequency (A+B)/2 = 441 Hz with amplitude controlled by (A-B)/2 = 1 Hz, not 2 Hz! We do hear two beats/second because each Cos has two amplitude lobes for each cycle. We only “perceive” the ENVELOPE at 2 Hz, but there is no 2 Hz in the Fourier spectrum. (Neither is there 441 Hz in the spectrum.) The only frequencies in the spectrum are A and B on the left side of the identity. And the polarity does flip every other lobe (inaudible in the example).
So, could the sunspot cycle really be 22 years, with every other 11 year lobe inverted (flipped magnetic field)? I guess so – hardly a new idea. Being in the envelope (the right side of the identity), neither a 11 years or a 22 years period need be present in the spectrum.
But this is way too simple. The trig identity shows just ordinary balanced modulation on the right side, but the actual SSN “envelope” does NOT resemble balanced modulation (the cosine). If anything, it resembles 100% amplitude modulation, which would not have a polarity reversal every other lobe. So it looks much more like the “power” (square) of the trig identity.
I know FAR too little about solar physics to even imagine a reality corresponding to this simple example. I just want to quantify the obvious toys is seen from the EE playground.
alex says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:57 pm
Yes, but the problem is we have only 400 years of direct sunspot observations and only 100 years of relatively good temperature measurements. This is barely too small to compare.
Tell that to all the people who claim that “it is the Sun, stupid”.
Willis,
Please explain any of your evidense of what you claim? Start with this one:
Can someone please explain the concept of “back radiation”, i.e. electromagnetic radiation (power transfer) in a direction of more intense electromagnetic field strength, at any frequency? Such concept is in opposition to all of Jimmy Maxwell’s equations. Such concept is also in defiance of Gus Kirchhoff’s laws of thermal radiation. In addition such flux, (power transfer) has never been observed, detected, or measured. Where does such fantasy originate and why?
Wow. 157 so far took the bait.
[??? .mod]
Whether solar activity affects the climate in shorter intervals? Of course it can be seen that in the cyclic temperature changes in the zone _. Us see changes in temperature in the zone _ above the equator since 1979.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_ALL_EQ_1979.gif
Can see a high temperature _ in the upper part _. The situation changes in the 80’s.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_ALL_EQ_1982.gif
Occurs rise in temperature in the central zone _. Temperature changes again in the 90’s. The temperature equalizes.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_ALL_EQ_1989.gif
Another change occurs suddenly in 2001. Temperatures increase _ in the upper zone and a decrease in the middle, which continues today. Thus, this period lasts for 13 years.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_ALL_EQ_2001.gif
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_ALL_EQ_2014.gif
Please check it out.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/
It should be in the ozone layer. Sorry.
[snip – very far off topic – this tread is about solar cycles and weather data – mod]
Isn’t 11 years half the full cycle, give or take a year or two?
Even if the effect of the sun is 1%, that would account for a large portion of it, wouldn’t it?
There are now words, but perhaps this will do http://tinyurl.com/oyonhfq.
Willis: “Now, there is a temptation to see the central figure as some kind of regular amplitude-modulated signal, with side-lobes. However, that’s not what’s happening here. There is no regular signal. ”
What is the point of doing a spectral analysis if you are going to refuse to believe what it produces.
There are all sorts of variations in the time series which results in an irregular but obvious “cycle”. The point of spectral analysis is to see what makes up those irregular bumps.
The main power is clearly a well defined triplet plus the circa 21y which is obviously related. But with all the intermediate smaller peaks and sub-10y “noise” you will get an irregular result when it’s all added together.
That does not mean that “there is no regular signal. “. It means you’ve found a strong regular signal with notable apparently random noise.
Lief stated in your last look at this that this represented an amplitude modulation. Are you concluding that he’s become a victim of that awful condition, cyclomania, too?
You are doing some interesting work but you seem to have dug your heals in so hard on your conclusion that there is nothing cyclic to be found, that you refuse to accept it even when you prove it yourself.
regards. Greg.
Willis:
I do not know if there is or is not a Sun-climate relationship. I write to comment on a response you made to Lord Monckton’s comment on your article.
In his post at May 24, 2014 at 3:17 pm which is here Lord Monckton wrote
That concurs with the finding of Friis-Christensen and Larsen.
(ref Friis-Frris-Christensen, E & Larsen, K “Length of the Solar Cycle: An Indicator of Solar Activity Closely Associated with Climate”, Science, 1991).
They found that the solar cycle length has an apparent relationship to global temperature.
Ii that finding is correct then the Sun’s variability has significant influence on climate but it would be expected that the ~11-year solar cycle would NOT have a discernible major influence on global climate because – as you say – there is no consistent 11-year cycle length.
The difficulty of your reply is stressed by an answer you provided to Mick in your post at May 24, 2014 at 4:20 pm which is here and includes this
The reason for the global seasonal temperature change is the different coverage of Northern hemisphere (NH()and Southern hemisphere (SH) by water (land is not as good a heat sink as water) so the seasonal variation is greater in the NH than the SH. This support’s Monckton’s claim of a great oceanic heat sink effect.
The seasonal variation is a constant length of 1 year so would not be seen as a variation related to solar cycle length. Indeed, any constant cycle would have no discernible effect on cycle length: and only VARIATIONS in cycle length(s) would have climate effects if Friis-Christensen and Larsen are right to some degree.
Please note that I am NOT saying either (or both) of you and Monckton is wrong: I am saying that your answers do not refute Monckton’s comment.
Richard
I’d be careful about dismissing correlations solely on the basis that there are periods when they don’t apply. Another effect may be slowly waxing and waning, such that the correlation is intermittent.
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 12:16 am
Lief stated in your last look at this that this represented an amplitude modulation. Are you concluding that he’s become a victim of that awful condition, cyclomania, too?
Just from the power spectrum you cannot tell what it is. From the physical process behind the spectrum one concludes that variation is an amplitude modulation. For Willis’s analysis it makes no difference what one assumes.
J Martin says:
May 24, 2014 at 2:01 pm
Exactly, we have a system responding to changes in multiple solar activities – TSI, UV level and wavelength, geomagnetic polarity, solar wind, solar flares etc – that affect the surface TSI through cloud formation and surface pressure via formation/destruction of ozone in the stratosphere that affect the position and strength of the jet Streams, buffered by ocean heat capacity and further complicated by heat distribution via ocean and atmospheric currents that are influenced by lunar Saros cycles, changes in the Earth’s electrical field, Stadium waves and other unknowns.
Joanna Haigh has a good review of these solar inputs and potential influences on climate
http://solarphysics.livingreviews.org/open?pubNo=lrsp-2007-2&page=articlesu11.html
So why would anyone expect to be able to pick out simple relationships between solar cycles and temperature in the short term (multi decadal) time frame even when they obviously exist on longer time scales. In his articles at ClimateEtc (essential reading for anyone interested in the analysis of climate change), Tomas Milanovic points out the futility of trying to model a complex spatio-temporal chaotic system using average global data like Hadcrut4 which is made up of disparate local data, especially when neither the mathematics not computing power exist to do so. He concludes
http://judithcurry.com/2014/05/23/how-simple-is-simple/#more-15591
http://judithcurry.com/2012/02/15/ergodicity/
http://judithcurry.com/2011/03/05/chaos-ergodicity-and-attractors/
http://judithcurry.com/2011/02/10/spatio-temporal-chaos/
[snip – very far off topic. This is a thread about solar cycles in weather data, we won’t divert to a Slayers diversion in this thread. -mod]
Interesting to see the lunar influence. A lot of people still seem to think the idea of atmospheric tides is a mental illness too. However, this could also be a consequence of SST changes. These 9 year cycles are clearly present in SST, as is the circa 13-13.5. I have no idea what that relates to but seeing it here in SLP tends to confirm that it is physically real.
http://climategrog.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/icoads_pds_9_grp.png
For some reason Nagasaki shows the strongest peak at circa 18y where as the more tropical sites are centred on circa 9 y. Probably latitude related, could be significant. Thanks.
Looking at your Tahiti plot you can see the same 10,11,11.8 frequencies that you found in figure 2. I’d suggest plotting the two together to verify or checking the numbers, but by eye it looks like something very close.
congratulations, I think you’ve found evidence of the illusive 11 year cycle… and it’s comparable to the lunar influence.
One thing to note, this is just spectral analysis splitting the peaks. The power of the modulated solar signal is the sum of those three peaks, so it’s quite significant.
Whether the temperature in the stratosphere above the equator can be attributed to the El Niño and La Nina? Of course I do.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_ALL_EQ_1997.gif
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_ALL_EQ_2007.gif
Willis: ” This, of course, is rank heresy to the current scientific climate paradigm, which holds that ceteris paribus, changes in temperature are a linear function of changes in forcing. I disagree. I say that the temperature of the planet is set by a dynamic thermoregulatory system composed of emergent phenomena that only appear when the surface gets hotter than a certain temperature threshold. ”
These two positions are not necessarily incompatible. (Just the weight and conclusions that are drawn).
I fully agree with you that the emergent systems in tropics closely regulate temps. I’m working on EBBE data that is showing very small sensitivity in the tropics. But even this can be a “linear function”.
Consider, tropical storms cause strong neg. f/b (locally non-linear). This counters (say) 90%-95% of the change in incoming radiation. That results in a small change in SST (which is still required to provoke the feedback, even if it’s very strong). There is no reason why this small result should not be linearly related to the disturbance. One key means to make a system linear is to add negative feedbacks (linear or not).
No one disagrees about the Plank feedback being the main linear feedback keeping things stable. In fact this is so taken for granted that climatologists often leave it altogether out when referring to feedbacks.
The argument is about whether hypothesised positive feedbacks reduce it, or non modelled feedbacks like tropical storms add to it, giving a very strongly stable system that is very insensitive to changes in forcing.
Your opposition to it being linear seems a little misplaced ( this is not the contention ) . You need to focus on the magnitude of the response , not spend effort contesting the linearity on the non-local scale.
Tahiti may be a first clue to establishing the scale of the effect in the tropics. I think you have a result.
From SAMURAI on May 24, 2014 at 8:28 pm:
Your call-out is in error. WFT goes “starting FROM this date” (inclusive) to “up TO this date” (exclusive). By going as you did from “to: 1880” for the first part to “from: 1881” for the second, you dropped a year. You ended up with 5 1-year gaps.
Also, by not specifying a “to” year for the last part, thus setting it to whatever is the latest month in the dataset, you’ve introduced the vagary of the annual cycle into the slope. Should have used “to: 2014” to get the last full year, 2013.
Here’s the proper call-out, with the trend line for the whole range:
[even longer WFT link]
db: Could there be a ≈22 year cycle?
Willis: “It’s certainly possible, db … but I’ve seen no sign of a 22-year cycle either. That’s why I ran the analysis from 7 – 25 years, to catch any such cycles.
No catches to date …”
====
Well there is a broad peak around 21 which probably reflects the 10,11,11.8 triplet . Since you are looking at non polarised data in SSN, you would not really expect to find 21-22 at all. The fact that this peak exists probably indicates a non linearity. It is broad and poorly resolved but likely to reflect the underlying magnetic processes.
KDK, when your trends don’t meet you have a problem. Shifting to 1910 works better. (No idea what a “call-out” is supposed to be though).
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1850/to:1880/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1850/to:1880/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1880/to:1910/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1880/to:1910/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1910/to:1943/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1910/to:1943/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1943/to:1976/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1943/to:1976/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1976/to:2004/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1976/to:2004/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2004/to:2014/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2004/to:2014/trend/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1850/to:2014/trend
Sadly WTF.org does not tell you what the fitted slopes are. By eye I’d estimate a very small increase in both the upward and downward trends. Whether that’s AGW, UHI or data figging at CRU is anyones guess. In any case it’s very small.
lsvalgaard says:
May 25, 2014 at 12:42 am
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 12:16 am
Lief stated in your last look at this that this represented an amplitude modulation. Are you concluding that he’s become a victim of that awful condition, cyclomania, too?
Just from the power spectrum you cannot tell what it is. From the physical process behind the spectrum one concludes that variation is an amplitude modulation. For Willis’s analysis it makes no difference what one assumes.
===
Thanks, indeed a power spectrum in just a first indication of a possible physical modulation.
More clearly , a triplet in the power spectrum is just a first indication of a possible physical modulation.
A greeting. Good job.
Because of the internal adjustments of the temperature on Earth would be better, instead of adjusting the cycles 11 to 11 years directly adjust it 11-15?
Moderator!
Where I left a simple comment it now says:
I was replying to this comment from “Will Janoschka”, that you have STILL let stand as of this writing, where they ask Willis to explain and justify back radiation, inherent Maxwell and Kirchoff law violations, that type crud.
I just gave them the links to Ira Glickstein’s “Visualizing the Greenhouse” series to explain back radiation.
And you HACKED my simple reply into looking like I was executing a full-blown thread hijack!
BAD Moderator! No cookie!
[Reply: Some moderators are not cut out for the job. ~Sr. Mod.]
Why do you expect Sun Spots to affect climate on Earth? Is it beacuse the total energy output from the Sun is proportional to the Sun Spots? I don’t know anything about it, that’s why I ask. I.e. I need a more basic primer on the proposed mechanism.
Willis
show us the terrestrial climate record that has any sign of being correlated with the 11-year sunspot cycles
The problem is you have already found it but can’t see it.
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/periodicity-analysis-berkely-earth.jpg
Just for interest, the late John Daly refers to an eleven year cycle in temperature data in one of the ‘climategate’ emails from 1996.
A Fourier transform is a standard method of detecting periodicity in data.
From Greg Goodman on May 25, 2014 at 1:37 am:
Better address that to “SAMURAI”, as that was who I was replying to, and I was just correcting the call-out.
Your loss. A call-out is when you spec.
Especially unless you click the “Raw Data” link and actually look for the “#Least squares trend line; slope = [number] per year” entries in the plain text data file.
It also helps to look on “WoodForTrees.org” instead of “WhatsTheFibonacci.org” (short version, wtf.org). Unless you really want wtf.org, and want to know the values of slopes fitted to Fibonacci sequences. Which is its own issue.
Just from the variation of TSI with the solar cycle. one would expect a cycle variation [valley to peak] variation of global temperature of 0.07C. This is probably below the noise level so far, so no wonder it doesn’t show up.
Willis,
I like you too much to not to say that: “don’t get caught up in your (new) proficiency in R … it’s just statistics … quite different from a (rock) solid theory …”
“Adam says: May 25, 2014 at 2:03 am
Why do you expect Sun Spots to affect climate on Earth? Is it because the total energy output from the Sun is proportional to the Sun Spots? I don’t know anything about it, that’s why I ask. I.e. I need a more basic primer on the proposed mechanism.”
Thank you Adam. My thoughts exactly, but expressed more politely. Looking forward to an article here on the subject. Based on the current performance the homo sapiensophobes or even the more moderate anthropophobes are unlikely to address it anytime soon.
Looking for mathematical relationships to cast light on this puzzle is a valid approach but unless you know what you are looking for and just need the proof, it has a low success rate.
This is not my field but let me try to illustrate a different approach. There is anecdotal evidence that solar cycles can influence our climate. What solar variables might affect our climate and how have these changed with time?
TSI we know about, but what about changes in spectrum in terms of energy at each frequency? We know that UV changes very significantly and has implications for atmospheric chemistry. What about the solar IR output?
Svensmark is doing something similar when he looks at the way the solar wind may modulate cosmic rays and subsequent cloud formation. Does the composition of the solar wind change?
A post at NTZ looks at the possible effect of solar wind velocity.
Think of the sun as a body that throws everything at us from plasma to gravitational waves and I’m sure we think of all sorts of ways that its output can influence our complex climate. The problem is that our climate scientists have been preoccupied with a small molecule for the last few decades and haven’t got around to understanding the basics.
“Adam says: May 25, 2014 at 2:03 am
Why do you expect Sun Spots to affect climate on Earth? Is it because the total energy output from the Sun is proportional to the Sun Spots? I don’t know anything about it, that’s why I ask. I.e. I need a more basic primer on the proposed mechanism.”
SSN is an indication of solar activity. If an indication of this can be found in climate then you can start worrying about the mechanism. If you can’t find evidence of it, you don’t need to waste time looking a mechanism.
regarding richardscourtney says:
May 25, 2014 at 12:34 am
=================================================
Richard, I said much the same thing here, in my usual layman fashion. David A says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:33 pm
Re. LT says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:58 pm
==============================
Thank you for your response.
“Sunspot number: 130”
http://www.spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=25&month=05&year=2014
They’re huge???????????
lgl says:
May 25, 2014 at 2:05 am
Willis
show us the terrestrial climate record that has any sign of being correlated with the 11-year sunspot cycles
The problem is you have already found it but can’t see it.
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/periodicity-analysis-berkely-earth.jpg
Yes, there’s a suggestion of similar 10,11,12 peaks but not bang on (12 looks more like 12.0 than 11.8). Worth closer inspection.
Willis Eschenbach (May 24, 2014 at 4:01 pm) – I don’t dispute that your method finds solar cycles quite well. I am saying that to look for the effect of solar cycles it would be more efficient to use SCN instead of date. But more importantly I think the non-linear coupled nature of weather/climate means that an attempted replication of Herschel’s findings would be a very useful test, ie. looking at just that limited period of UK-only temperature & precipitation. It is very possible that any effect of solar cycles on weather/climate is inconsistent in both location and time. eg, just maybe Herschel was onto something genuine, but some other factor operated in sync with sunspots at that particular place-time but not at others. I don’t think you are likely to find everything all at once, but by addressing place-time subsets you may be able to pick up some vital clues.
Happy hunting.
Oh and Richard and Willis, I would add that during the SH summer the earth receives almost seven percent MORE insolation during those three months, but the atmospheric T is LOWER, for the reasons Richard mentioned. The fact that this increased insolation change (far greater then any anthropogenic GHE and far greater then any 11 year solar insolation change) manifests in the atmosphere to the OPPOSITE sign of the input, is actually a fairly strong indication of both the complexity of climate, and to the importance of the oceans.
sorry, please add to the last sentence…” manifests in the atmosphere to the OPPOSITE sign of the input, is actually a fairly strong indication of both the complexity of climate, and to the importance of the oceans” AS A LONG TERM DRIVER OF CLIMATE , meaning decades or longer.
“I never could find any trace of the 11-year sunspot cycle”
The cycle is 22 years long. Remember the suns magnetic field flips every 11 years, so it takes 22 years before you get back to the start point.
mwhite says:
May 25, 2014 at 3:31 am
The cycle is 22 years long. Remember the suns magnetic field flips every 11 years, so it takes 22 years before you get back to the start point.
The amount of energy that the Sun sends our way [in whatever form] varies with an 11-yr cycle. The ‘flip’ does not change that.
11 years is not long enough — I can’t believe what I just read. Find the sunspot chart at MSFC that shows back to the maunder minimum. Then find global warming, the mini ice age, and the pause in global warming on that chart. Find the Vostok Ice Core Data used to teach Yale students about the climate. Then find the industrial revolution on that chart.
This is one of the more misleading articles I have seen on solar activity… like something I’d find on climate.gov.
PS- hi Leif, thanks for having Willy put back the SPF data.
Solar cycle forcing is in the same category as CO2 forcing – measurable though tiny, and completely dwarfed into insignificance by the hydrological cycle and oceans.
Emergent phenomena are the negative system response to any forcing and they do indeed keep the system stable.
Thus observing a change in the pattern of emergent phenomena is all one would expect to see in response to a forcing element.
Over a single solar cycle the scale of the solar induced change in emergent phenomena is less than that from internal system chaotic variability and even over several solar cycles the solar effect is heavily modulated by a lagging ocean response which can be in or out of phase with that solar variability.
However, over the course of a century and longer we do see a change in emergent phenomena in response to solar changes in the form of variations in the net latitudinal positions of the jet stream tracks and climate zones.
We saw that from the MWP to the LIA to date and even in the changes observed since around 2000 when the jet streams became more meridional at a time of less active sun and the earlier warming trend came to a halt.
So the issue really is as to how and why those latitudinal shifts occur naturally.
It can only happen due to changes in the gradient of tropopause height between equator and poles.
So no response from Willis to my previous comment…
Come on Willis, is the effective emissivity (NOT apparent emissivity) of water 0.97 or 0.67? Game changer, you know it. But you don’t know how to run the empirical experiment do you lukewarmer?
I do.
I have.
Utterly pwned Willis. And how….
The sun heats the oceans.
The atmosphere cools the oceans.
Radiative gases cool the atmosphere.
But you believe that the oceans are are a “near blackbody”. Therefore you cannot comprehend the solar influence on climate.
In reply to lsvalgaard
lsvalgaard says: May 24, 2014 at 9:55 pm
Apart from your musings being incorrect, e.g. as shown by the direct observations of Ap shows both a solar cycle and the lack of any trend over the last 170 years
William:
You are plotting Ap against what? Try plotting Ak (three hour average rather than Ap daily average) against planetary temperature changes for the last 30 years (Oh, you keep forgetting about the peer reviewed paper that did that and found a strong correlation.) Why is there no comment concerning GCR? I cannot figure you out. The planet has started to cool in the same high latitude regions that warmed in the last 70 years. The sun caused the high latitude warming in the last 70 years and the sun is now causing the high latitude cooling.
Planetary cooling has started. There is now record sea ice in the Antarctic for every month of the year. Arctic sea ice is predicted to recover to normal this summer. There is now a persistent cold anomaly over Greenland. As we are about to observed the El Niño event will be suppressed due to the lowest solar wind burst strength in roughly 100 years. (As the AGU solar updated noted the density of the solar heliosphere has dropped by 40% which is reducing the magnetic field strength of the solar wind bursts. Due to this change the solar wind bursts are have less affect. The solar wind bursts amplify El Niño events.)
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/webform/query.cgi?startday=27&startmonth=03&startyear=1975&starttime=00%3A00&endday=27&endmonth=04&endyear=2014&endtime=00%3A00&resolution=Automatic+choice&picture=on
Once again about global warming and solar activity by K. Georgieva, C. Bianchi2 and B. Kirov
We show that the index commonly used for quantifying long-term changes in solar activity, the sunspot number, accounts for only one part of solar activity and using this index leads to the underestimation of the role of solar activity in the global warming in the recent decades. A more suitable index is the geomagnetic activity which reflects all solar activity, and it is highly correlated to global temperature variations in the whole period for which we have data.
In Figure 6 the long-term variations in global temperature are compared to the long-term variations in geomagnetic activity as expressed by the ak-index (Nevanlinna and Kataja 2003). The correlation between the two quantities is 0.85 with p<0.01 for the whole period studied.
Solar Activity and Global Warming Revisited K. Georgieva, B. Kirov
The solar activity index commonly used for long-term studies is the sunspot number as it has the longest data record. But sunspots reflect only the solar activity originating from closed magnetic field regions. The regions of open magnetic field – coronal holes, sources of high speed solar wind and drivers of recurrent geomagnetic activity, are not accounted for in the sunspot index. It appears that in the last decades the impact of coronal holes has increased which can be explained by the increasing tilt of the heliospheric current sheet. This increased tilt means that the Earth encounters two high speed streams from coronal holes per solar rotation and higher geomagnetic activity. On the other hand, the tilt of the heliospheric current sheet is related to the galactic cosmic rays modulation, and galactic cosmic rays are considered key agents mediating solar activity influences on terrestrial temperature. Therefore, using the sunspot number alone as a measure of solar activity leads to the underestimation of the role of solar activity for the global warming in the recent decades.
Evolution of the correlation between solar and geomagnetic activity
Kishcha et al. [21] examined the 23-year (in order to eliminate the solar cycle variation and the even-odd cycle differences) running correlation between aa-index and sunspot number, and found a linear decreasing trend, with a quasi-periodicity of 45-50 years superposed on it. They supposed that the cause of the variations in the so large magnetic activity correlation could be the variation in the time delay of the geomagnetic indices relative to the sunspot number. Further, they speculated that, dividing solar activity into sporadic (related to CME’s and hence to sunspots) and recurrent (related to high-speed solar wind from coronal holes), we can even neglect the sporadic sunspot related activity when comparing with the annual geomagnetic activity indices (William: The driving factor is the change in the solar wind speed which is proportional to the three hour geomagnetic index.)
http://www.essc.psu.edu/essc_web/seminars/spring2006/Mar1/Bond%20et%20al%202001.pdf
Persistent Solar Influence on North Atlantic Climate During the Holocene (William: Holocene is the name for this interglacial period)
Atmospheric Ionization and Clouds as Links between Solar Activity and Climate By Brian Tinsley and Fangqun Yu http://www.utdallas.edu/physics/pdf/Atmos_060302.pdf
Greg Goodman says: May 25, 2014 at 3:16 am
“SSN is an indication of solar activity.”
Anything is possible depending on how SNN, solar activity and climate are defined. Irrespectively, if <0.01% variations in the total atmospheric gas composition are considered relevant, variations of similar magnitude in the sun's total output are surely analyzed with the same dedication, right?
I have enjoyed this discussion.
While I was absorbing the comments.
It occurred to me that the Chicken in the pot analogy may prove the point.
If the pot is sitting on an induction hob.
Is the quest for the energy forcing looking out instead of in.
What IF the earth it self is acting as an induction Hob?
Iron core rotating in a liquid magma.
Inside a magnetic field.
Just a Thought.
Obliged Twobob
William Astley says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:20 am
You are plotting Ap against what?
Against time for the past 170 years
Try plotting Ak (three hour average rather than Ap daily average) against planetary temperature changes for the last 30 years
I think the global planetary temperature does not change on a three-hour time-scale, but you seem to believe anything that you carefully select. As the Goracle says: “if you don’t know anything, everything is possible”.
Thanks for the SFT R-code Willis. This is definitely a useful addition to the toolbox. Primarily for it’s ability to deal with data having breaks like the Tahiti SLP.
I’ve just printed out the number from the SSN SFT to look at the detail. The “21” is at 21.06 to the resolution available. Now I wanted to look at the bump on the side of the central peak of the triplet. It’s at 10.58y.
Now that is half 21.16 which seems a credible match 21.06 peak . That leads me to wonder whether the 10,11,11,8 triplet is not something physically different from the 10.58/21 peaks.
Maybe this is another reason for the variable shape of the solar peaks. There’s a lesser signal at 10.58 that is drifting in and out of phase with the main 11 x 136 modulated signal.
Like I said, we should not be seeing signed magnetic period in the spectrum of the unsigned SSN data. My reading of this is that the non-linear part that is showing up, and does not have the modulation, has a slightly different frequency. 10.58 compared to 11.0
Perhaps lsvalgaard can comment on anything solar physics may know about that.
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:36 am
Perhaps lsvalgaard can comment on anything solar physics may know about that.
As far as we know, there is only one solar cycle [and it has an amplitude that seems to vary on a 100-yr time scale for poorly understood reasons, and ‘period’ that is not very stable]. We know of no other ‘cycles’ drifting in an out of phase, but one can, of course, always ascribe things to causes not known, in which case, anything goes. I would not call that science, though.
Willis (and Mike Jonas) — Sir William Herschel’s work on sunspots and wheat prices has been revisited. See
Pustil’nik, Lev, and Gregory Din. “Influence of solar activity on the state of the wheat market in medieval England.” Solar Physics 223.1-2 (2004): 1-2.
There’s a pdf of the paper at http://arxiv.org/pdf/astro-ph/0312244&
This graph is total planetary polar sea verses time. As the graph shows polar sea ice has recovered. Polar temperatures and high latitude temperatures are colder due to the increase in low level clouds caused by the increased amount of ions created by the increased amount of GCR that is now striking the earth’s atmosphere in high latitude regions. (The GCR change has the greatest affect at high latitude regions as the due to the orientation and strength of the geomagnetic field.)
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/iphone/images/iphone.anomaly.global.png
Arctic sea ice, notice the recovery.
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_stddev_timeseries.png
Antarctic sea ice, note the Antarctic sea ice is not more than 2 sigma above the 30 year average for every month of the year.
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/S_stddev_timeseries.png
In reply to:
lsvalgaard says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:28 am
William Astley says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:20 am
You are plotting Ap against what?
Against time for the past 170 years
Try plotting Ak (three hour average rather than Ap daily average) against planetary temperature changes for the last 30 years I think the global planetary temperature does not change on a three-hour time-scale, but you seem to believe anything that you carefully select. As the Goracle says: “if you don’t know anything, everything is possible”.
William: What in the world are you talking about? I did not say to plot 3 hour planetary temperature. You do not understand the mechanisms.
The magnitude of Ak, the three hour change to the geomagnetic field, is correlated to how strongly the solar wind burst can remove ions from the atmosphere. The solar wind bursts create a space charge differential in the ionosphere which removes ions from high latitude and equatorial regions. A reduction in ions causes a reduction in low level clouds in high latitude regions which causes warming for roughly three to five days, for each significant event.
The number, magnitude, and time between solar wind bursts determines the affect the solar wind bursts have planetary cloud and planetary temperature.
In equatorial regions the reduction in ions changes cloud droplet size which in turn changes how much upward long radiation can pass through the cloud.
“lsvalgaard says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:49 am
As far as we know, there is only one solar cycle [and it has an amplitude that seems to vary on a 100-yr time scale for poorly understood reasons, and ‘period’ that is not very stable]. We know of no other ‘cycles’ drifting in an out of phase, but one can, of course, always ascribe things to causes not known, in which case, anything goes. I would not call that science, though.”
In other words, ACO2 driven climate change.
Willis Eschenbach says:
“Why The 11-year Cycle?: Because it is the biggest cycle, and we know all of the other cycles (magnetism, TSI, solar wind) move in synchronicity with the sunspots.”
Willis, ignoring my comments won’t make the facts go away. http://snag.gy/5XTIk.jpg
I did most of my research on sunspot cycles in a bathtub at age three. My mother put an end to my research, due to the size of the waves I generated, which is why I became a writer and not a scientist.
However, looking back, I recall you had to get the timing right. You had to slide forward as the wave went forward and slide back as the wave went back, or else your efforts would be counterproductive. If you made the exact same effort at the wrong time, you would expend the same energy but rather than increasing the wave you would negate the wave.
I figure the sun just doesn’t have its timing right. For one thing, it has to learn to be more regular. I’ve told it over and over to stick to a cycle of exactly eleven years, but the blame thing refuses to listen to me.
If it refuses to be regular, then it has to be more observant and wait for just the right time to slide forward.
Lastly, the sun has to be humble and understand there are other powers in play. This is analogous to there being more than one fanny sliding to and fro in the bathtub, however such symbolism approaches obscenity, so I think I’d better quit.
William Astley says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:55 am
William: What in the world are you talking about? I did not say to plot 3 hour planetary temperature. You do not understand the mechanisms.
You said “Try plotting Ak (three hour average rather than Ap daily average) against planetary temperature changes for the last 30 years”,
And your ‘mechanism’ is nonsense, so cannot be understood.
Ulric Lyons says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:02 am
“all of the other cycles (magnetism, TSI, solar wind) move in synchronicity with the sunspots.”
Willis, ignoring my comments won’t make the facts go away.
The solar wind speed also [as you show] varies with the sunspot cycle, just in a more complicated manner: http://www.leif.org/research/Climatological%20Solar%20Wind.png
lsvalgaard says:
“The solar wind speed also [as you show] varies with the sunspot cycle, just in a more complicated manner:”
Do you see a clear sunspot cycle pattern in the solar wind speed data here then?
http://snag.gy/5XTIk.jpg
You wont see much of an 11 year pattern in most records, because the large +ve to -ve amplitude variations and also the period is too short to show up in short term ocean-atmosphere temperature exchange trends. There is too much of a lag effect.
In other words, it’s like turning an air conditioner on and off every 10 seconds or so, but making it stronger each time, and then measuring the effect of this on the temperature of a distant part of a large room. Short term temperature fluctuations might not show up at all, or barely, because it takes time for the longer term heating or cooling trend to disperse through the air in the room. Short term effects are nullified, especially if the period is short and the amplitude variation large. (The oceans are even slower than air, with regards to heat dispersal/exchange).
What you might see however, is a warming or cooling trend over time as long as the overall trend is in one direction, which is also what one sees in the temperature record for the 20th century-a long term warming trend. You would also expect some delay, on the scale of decades, which is also what one sees-the temperature kept rising for several decades once sunspots trends stopped increasing (which also happened to correlate with a positive PDO).
lsvalgaard says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:49 am
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:36 am
Perhaps lsvalgaard can comment on anything solar physics may know about that.
As far as we know, there is only one solar cycle [and it has an amplitude that seems to vary on a 100-yr time scale for poorly understood reasons, and ‘period’ that is not very stable]. We know of no other ‘cycles’ drifting in an out of phase, but one can, of course, always ascribe things to causes not known, in which case, anything goes. I would not call that science, though.
=====
Thanks the quick out line of what is known of solar cycles.
” but one can, of course, always ascribe things to causes not known, in which case, anything goes. I would not call that science, though.”
Well surely science should start with observation , then analysis of the observations, then attempt to explain and eventually predict behaviour in advance if the explanations are accurate.
One has to initially ascribe an observed pattern to causes unknown , then seek the cause. Otherwise, dismiss it as a fluke of stochastic variability and ignore it.
What happens to this kind of detail in the spectra as a result the proposed corrections to observation would be interesting. Does the adjustment sharpen the spectrum, resolve previously unresolved detail, for example?
Ulric Lyons says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:20 am
“The solar wind speed also [as you show] varies with the sunspot cycle, just in a more complicated manner:”Do you see a clear sunspot cycle pattern in the solar wind speed data here then?
Yes. Especially when you have more than ten solar cycles to look at. The important features are a maximum before solar minimum and minima at solar minimum and often at solar maximum too. It is well-understood why that is.
If it’s not the sun, then why do ice-ages come and go with orbital variations?
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:24 am
What happens to this kind of detail in the spectra as a result the proposed corrections to observation would be interesting. Does the adjustment sharpen the spectrum, resolve previously unresolved detail, for example?
Perhaps. See e.g. http://www.leif.org/EOS/Lomb-Sunspot-Cycle-Revisited.pdf
Willis. I don’t see any reason to limit the resolution of the spectrum to monthly intervals. You’re fitting an analytic function. To accurately resolve where the various peaks lie, it would be useful to decrease the step.
Particularly down around five years the freq quantisation is a bit crude.
I’m trying to see what to change to achieve this but if you can suggest what to poke it would be helpful.
I have learned the hard way that any time you do an analysis of data, you really need to stop, write down your assumptions and draw a picture of your model. In this article you assume a frequency model and you want to compare frequencies of sun activity to climate features.
Why?
You have the data for sunspots and climate features. Compare them. There is no need to approximate quasi periodic data with frequency analysis to reduce all that lovely data to a frequency and phase angle and throw away all the wonderful information. Use the data!
Spreadsheets are wonderful for checking to see if your proposed analysis will work. Build a spreadsheet and create a parameter that tracks the historical solar activity precisely with some lag. Now add noise to magnitude and time lag. At least one year for the lag noise to simulate how the peak in solar activity is not synchronized with the earths orbit.. Now run your analysis on the parameter you created that does track solar activity. Can your analysis find the original magnitude and lag? How about after throwing in a couple volcanoes?
I have done this type of analysis checking at work and it really is useful. I was able to show that we had to measure the performance of a product to a minimum of one half its life to have a reliable measure of the expected lifetime due to measurement noise.
There’s an anti-correlation between sunspots and volcanic activity [1], shown by the observed last 400 years Little Ice-Age cooling (that started with the 1257 Samalas, Indonesia eruption) after continuous weak solar cycles, and vice-versa. Why does this happen? Cosmic rays’ muons (that rise on Earth when the Sun is weak) cause volcanic eruptions [2].
1: Jaroslav Strestik, Possible correlation between solar and volcanic activity in a long-term scale: Volcanic activity is usually higher in periods of prolonged minima of solar activity and vice versa. adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2003ESASP.535..393S
2: Explosive volcanic eruptions triggered by cosmic rays: Volcano as a bubble chamber
Toshikazu Ebisuzaki, Hiroko Miyahara, Ryuho Kataoka, Tatsuhiko Sato, Yasuhiro Ishimine
sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1342937X10001966
phlogiston says:
May 25, 2014 at 3:59 am
“Solar cycle forcing is in the same category as CO2 forcing – measurable though tiny, and completely dwarfed into insignificance by the hydrological cycle and oceans.”
Unlike CO2, solar activity provides the energy for the hydrological cycle and oceans that circulate around the planet regulating the planets temperature.
Sun spot activity that is 11 year cycle doesn’t show up as an exact match due to the climate being SLOWER to react to changes in solar energy effects due to our atmosphere, moisture and massive oceans.
Where we see a direct link between sun spots and cold cycles is when there are long time periods in multiple decades and centuries where solar sun spot activity is extremely low or non existent or very strong and energetic.
Anyone who thinks the sun isn’t the #1 driver of all planetary climates is crazy. All planets would be dead balls of ice if it weren’t for the sun!
Why bother? Everything is known to be caused by man and blessed are those who know the truth & correct the heretics. /sarc off.
lsvalgaard says:
“Yes. Especially when you have more than ten solar cycles to look at. The important features are a maximum before solar minimum and minima at solar minimum and often at solar maximum too. It is well-understood why that is.”
The variations in the timing and intensity of the highs and lows doesn’t make for a very clear 10-11yr cycle, especially in the last 50yrs:
http://snag.gy/r55Lr.jpg
Theory: the 11 year sunspot period should be reflected in the temp. record.
Observation: it is not.
Science says discard or modify the theory, climate science says modify the observations.
Science: believe only what you can prove.
Climate science: try to prove what you believe.
Piers Corbyn at weatheraction.com knows plenty about the 11 year 22 year and other solar cycles
David A:
Re your post at May 25, 2014 at 3:18 am which is here.
It was not my intention to ‘steal your thunder’ and I apologise if I did.
Richard
If it’s a chaotic system, why would there be a signal to be found at all?
Daily, the difference is HUGE, and swamps any competing factors; the yearly difference is also very large. If you’re gently swirling a marble in a bowl, but once a minute you give a size-10 jerk to one side, and once every ten minutes you give a size-1 jerk (additive) to that side, I expect you’ll see trending. But if every 90-150 minutes you add in a size 0.01-0.1 size twitch, are you really going to see any change in the path of the marble, which you can’t predict anyway?
If you start to slow down your swirling (twitches and all), the marble may still have enough momentum to continue a wild path, before it -eventually- calms down.
Every once in a while, of course, you’ll get a “Perfect Storm” which knocks the whole system into a different “attractor” (the marble gains enough momentum to fly completely out of the bowl; the climate enters some entirely different arrangement). This could even happen in a fairly quiet bowl.
Doesn’t mean the Sun isn’t driving climate; without the Sun, the marble doesn’t swirl at all. The shape of the bowl — and we’ve got a really complex bowl, here — does the rest.
Nice article, Willis. I think it excellently demonstrates the noncomputability of climate.
William Astley
In the polar regions in the ozone layer strongly operate changes of cosmic radiation (ionization of ozone, especially in the winter), but over the equator changes in the UV range (due to changes in magnetic activity of the sun) cause changes in the ozone. Thus, the air circulation during high and low solar activity is different due to changes in pressure. If the activity is low long enough, establishes a steady trend in the first air circulation in the stratosphere (eg, the polar vortex) and the troposphere. It seems to me that the more it you develop. Thank you.
In as much as I find the emergent phenomena regulation hypothesis compelling, I don’t see any reason why there would have to be a 11 year signal in the temperature record for there to be significant influence from solar variations on Earth’s temperature. In the same way I don’t seek AM stations on the FM dial, I don’t find the lack of evidence for instantaneous response to solar variation as compelling evidence for discounting solar influence all together. Just eyeballing the sunspot record it is at once obvious that there is a frequency modulation influence that sunspots represent a decent proxy for and simultaneously apparent that the sunspot proxy variation is not the only influence affecting Earth’s climate. The evidence as I see it says it’s not the sun, nor the CO2, nor the emergent phenomena alone but rather all these and much more that ultimately factor into the amalgamation of damped systems that are referred to as Earth’s climate.
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=13519
http://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/research-pages/potential-climatic-variables/
From Real Climate for example we have
“It has been known for some time that over a solar cycle, different wavelengths vary with different amplitudes. For instance, Lean (2000) showed that the UV component varied by about 10 times as much as the total solar irradiance (TSI) did over a cycle. This information (and subsequent analyses) have lent a lot of support to the idea that solar variability changes have an important amplification via changes in stratospheric ozone (Shindell et al (2001), for instance). So it is not a novel finding that the SIM results in the UV don’t look exactly like the TSI. What is a surprise is that for the visible wavelengths, SIM seems to suggest that the irradiance changes are opposite in sign to the changes in the TSI. – See more at: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/10/solar-spectral-stumper/#sthash.PiyzpUkn.dpuf”
…where you can see the UV was measured to inversely vary with TSI (ie sunspots). Furthermore it varied more than expected. And that’s from only a little data.
So Willis is making big statements based on flimsy knowledge because how do we know some cycles have less UV and others have more UV on average and hence their impacts on climate are different even though the TSI itself is about the same?
This is where Leif chimes in and says the atmospheric ionisation proxy implies previously understood changes in UV but I’m sceptical. Why else would people be surprised at the actual amount of UV variability and its opposite sign to TSI when its actually measured?
Now, I’m not saying the sun IS responsible for any of the recently observed climate change but until we understand the significance of the changes within the spectrum and its impact on the various levels of the atmosphere, I’d say the jury is going to be out and you can argue all you like but its still based on assumption. The assumption that TSI is the best measure of solar variability wrt climate change.
“””””…..R Taylor says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:29 am
If it’s not the sun, then why do ice-ages come and go with orbital variations?……”””””
There have been many studies of this, and the conclusion is that the coming and going of ice ages with orbital variations, is caused by orbital variations that happen at the same time.
It’s not the sun; which knows nowt, about our orbital variations !
Despite the presence of the “near-infinite heat sinks” of the ocean and outer space, the global temperature changes by 4°C or so over the course of the year.
===================
say what! Willis somewhere along the line I missed this information. We have a 4C annual fluctuation in temperature globally every year and people have their nickers in a knot over a 0.7C fluctuation over a century?
question 1: what causes the global average to change 4C during the year?
question 2: statistically, if we see 4C variation in a signal in 1 year, what sort of variation could be expected in 100 years?
question 3: what effect does the assumed probability distribution have on question/answer 2?
William Astley
The ice around Antarctica will increasedespite temperature jumps above the Arctic Circlesince steadily falling temperature of the southern ocean. This is due to the strong low-pressure systems that occur around Antarctica, when pressure rises above the polar circle. This reduces the access of solar energy beyond the polar circle. The same happens in the north. We’ll see this clearly in July in the stratosphere over the Antarctic.
as I recall, the most compelling evidence is that less sunspots correlate with longer solar cycles and lower global temperatures, and more sunspots correlate with shorter solar cycles and higher global temperatures.
what I have trouble with is seeing how this would show up as a fixed length signal in the temperature data. maybe it would, but this seems to me to be accidental at best.
when something shows correlation to a change in the cycle length why would it to also show correlation to a fixed cycle length of similar period? I’m having trouble visualizing how this would work.
One major contribution of sunspot CMEs, that are Earth directed, are the effects on the Earth’s plasmasphere CO-ROTATION, sub-rotation and super-rotation. There are also effects on atmospheric INFLATION rates/durations from heated,charged particles, raising and lowering of all atmospheric constituencies over the sunspot cycle are seen. Looking at the graphs from Ulrich’s post is pretty obvious then that the amount/strength/duration of geomagnetic activity is a major player for temp/climate..
http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/images/image022.jpg
Causes of variability in plasmasphere rotation rate: IMAGE EUV observations (Invited)
2010
Galvan, D. A.; Moldwin, M.; Sandel, B. R.; Crowley, G.
…IMAGE EUV observations demonstrate that the plasmasphere usually does not corotate as assumed in simple convection models, even at low L shells. The prevailing hypothesis states that plasmaspheric subcorotation is due to enhanced auroral zone Joule heating which drives equatorward thermospheric winds. As the neutral thermospheric material moves to lower latitudes, it grows farther from the Earth’s spin axis and turns westward to conserve angular momentum. This induces a westward motion in the ionosphere (a subcorotation), which produces a change in the corotation electric field that maps out to the plasmasphere, causing a subcorotation there as well…
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2010AGUFMSA33C..03G full not available
Length of day (LOD/rotation) is also affected by the above, which is seen in the sunspot cycle. Its periodicity is on the up and down swing of the cycle. A bicycle hee hee.. The rising sunspot cycles over the last century we added time to our LOD. Now we are seeing the first slow down as evidenced in the arctic, with the little ice age persistent pattern.. may be..
wheel in the sky keep on turning
Where did I leave off reading up there..oh ya Astley
The Aa index on which your plot was based has a calibration error in 1957.
=================
we seems to have a lot of corrections to the past in climate science.
and how do we know the past is wrong? because it doesn’t match the predictions of theory. a compelling circular argument by which current science can never be wrong. until it becomes the past. at which point it becomes wrong.
William Astley
When it comes to the amount clouds due to the higher ionization by GCR, it is sufficient to take a look at satellite.
http://www.sat24.com/image2.ashx?region=world&time=false&index=1
Willis, 3 points:
1) The AMO is a 66 year cycle. You should be looking for a 66 year cycle.
2) Recently it has been discovered that while TSI doesn’t fluctuate much, the UV component does. We don’t have enough data to check that out.
3) If Nick Stokes agrees with you, you are on the wrong track.
Good stuff Willis. What a superb post and discussion – classic WUWT. Got to dash – got a plane to catch.
Uh huh. I’m no expert on any of this stuff, but I have noticed some things about the sun’s ability to influence temperatures. Mostly I’ve noticed that when the Sun’s rays are blocked (either at night or by cloud cover) it gets cooler. I live in the mid latitudes, but this principle seems to hold when I’m visiting the tropics or the Arctic. I’ve also noticed that just small changes in latitude or in seasonal variations that change the angle of the Sun’s light, also seem to influence how warm or cold it becomes. Taking these things into consideration, when I hear, “It’s the Sun, stupid,” it seems like common sense. If it is not the Sun, itself, then I have to conclude that it has to do with whatever facilitates or inhibits the amount of radiation the Earth receives from the Sun.
@Willis Eschenbach
…
I’ve created this graph this morning to show you the general idea and where to look for a trend between solar activity with regional UK and Ireland temperatures.
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/stornoway-nov-ssn-v-mar-tmin-1875-2009.gif
I’ve used Monthly values of temperature and sunspot numbers for this example.
1.Blue is Greenwich sunspot numbers for November.
2.Green is Stornoway temperatures for March.
3.Both trends have a moving average of 11.
Notice how the temperature trend has a lower amplitude following successive weaker solar cycles and a higher amplitude following successive stronger solar cycles.
All of the various commenters’ sun theories alluded to (and I say that term disparagingly because of the commenters’ deplorable lack of valid and reliable data) fail to do the most important first thing. You must rule out intrinsic drivers having enough capacity to store sufficient energy to create and destroy short and long term temperature change. First, destroy that source. Tell me how it cannot be the source. Tell me our oceans have not the capacity to store energy and release it in varying amounts over varying time scales. Disprove that and you will have my attention.
@Willis Eschenbach
Here the data I used.
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/stornoway-nov-ssn-v-mar-tmin-1875-2009.xls
@Willis Eschenbach
Here’s the data I used.
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/stornoway-nov-ssn-v-mar-tmin-1875-2009.xls
Well, Pamela, why should the oceans do that even if they could? Without an external driver, the excursions would peter out.
============
Just a small nit. The “can’t prove a negative” statements are annoying. The lack of logic mars an otherwise nice article and calls into question the logical ablity of the presenter.
The more I read, the more I am appalled.
It is disheartening to read so many offerings here devoid of basic scientific understanding regarding several key factors, but especially regarding what is an Earth factor and what is a non-Earth factor of temperature trend.
Earth’s [axle] rotation, its orbital wobble, its volcanoes, its massive layered oceans and their currents, its teleconnected massive layered atmosphere and large and small scale pressure systems, and its land masses are all intrinsic Earth factors. Quite powerful ones to be exact. Shine a steady SWIR heat source on such a living, dynamic system and you will get all kinds of variations.
That commenters here so readily ignore, or worse are confused by such factors in preference to tiny gnat’s ass hairs gnaws at my teacher’s brain.
Kim. Your comment is one of those that heightens my disappointment here. Unbelievable lack of basic science regarding Earth’s physical systems.
Pam, you’re obviously an expert scientist, funny I’ve never seen you post any of your work. Maybe I missed something.
DR says:
May 24, 2014 at 6:54 pm
R. de Haan,
Thanks for the link. Is discussion about Piers Corbyn forbidden on WUWT now?
I don’t know, probably for the same reason Ron Paul never made the Presidency.
Corbyn, a Dragon, denies any CO2 effect and that goes against another consensus which is connected to the green house effect.
I think the green house effect is BS.
richardscourtney says:
May 25, 2014 at 6:18 am
David A:
Re your post at May 25, 2014 at 3:18 am which is here.
It was not my intention to ‘steal your thunder’ and I apologise if I did.
Richard
============================\
Quiet the opposite. Rather I consider it a compliment to myself if I notice the same thing you do.
As to stealing my thunder, well it appears to have been at the most a small pop in a cap gun.
However I did once get suspended from riding the Disneyland Matterhorn ride for shooting off a party popper. When I explained that they only contained something like .009 grams of gun powder, and were legal I was released.
ferdberple says:
May 25, 2014 at 7:16 am
Because we discover more data and uncover errors in past treatment.This is the way it has always been done and will continue to be done in the future.
Willis: Which sea level pressure did you use? If you used the computed sea level pressure
which is “corrected” for the ambient temperature, and the 12 hour before ambient
temperature, you may run into a problem due to the synthetic “R-value” correction which
becomes part of the computation. This value is derived to correct for deviations between
low elevation stations and higher elevation stations, which sample at a lower ambient
air pressure. Such a “r-value” correction can cause real problems, as it includes a
smoothing process based on surrounding stations in the mountains
(homoganization anyone?) to get a much smoother map plot.
I would suggest that you use “Altimeter Settings” as your pressure reference, as
they are based on the “Standard Atmosphere,” and can be computed back to true
station pressures (at the altitude of the measuring station) without any diurnal
temperature correction/r-value corrections applied.
A case in point. Many here have mentioned- or alluded to- the Maunder Minimum as their solar theory-supporting basis for their mechanism. Really? If you do that, you will have, apparently without your knowledge, disproven your solar speculation. Again, what lack of knowledge regarding Earth’s physical systems and history!
Greg, any standard high school Earth Science textbook presents a treatise on basic Earth systems. There is no need for plagiarizing on my part. Granted, the new editions have chapters on global warming-related greenhouse gasses and presents the basic calculable warming premise well enough but fails to consider Earth’s complex response to such relatively tiny changes in total ppm of greenhouse gasses such as we have seen in the past 100 years. These chapters especially fail to consider that warming response in the context of an extremely chaotic system capable of mimicking such temperature rise due to other wholly intrinsic and natural factors.
Thank you willis.
Let me make a general observation. In years of observing this debate skeptics generally fall into these camps.
1. I have nothing to prove. I doubt all. These folks will just criticize all and any theory. These folks are consistently skeptical. Well, for the most part. There will always come a time and place when they espouse “some’ belief in something. At this point you have them. Why? because when you examine
the BASIS for this belief you will find that in this place they accept the kinds of evidence they doubt
in other places. The simplest example is people who doubt reconstructions until they find ones
they like. or people who deny appeals to authority and then quote feynman, even the ironic
“science is belief in the ignorance of experts” thats my favorite self defeating appeal to authority.
or you will find people who reject climate models, but then use reanalysis data. Or refuse to believe
papers from Mann because there is no code and data, but accept papers they like where the authors practice science in manner more closed than mann. In short, no one I have met is consistently skeptical
of everything. But we knew this centuries ago: skepticism cannot be lived.
2. Skeptics who believe that “its something else” This is known as ABC. Anything But C02. In
some cases they have a “theory” its the ocean, its the sun, etc. In these cases you will find
( as you do here ) that the evidence for their theory is scant. They rely here and there on bits
and pieces or just general ideas. The sun drives the temperature from day to night, from season
to season, therefore it must drive from decade to decade and century to century. These theories
are shallow and brittle and one dimensional. they aim at explaining temperature only, when
a theory of the climate needs to explain everything. in short, they try to replace a theory that aims at completeness ( current climate science) with a theory that explains one feature,one low dimensional feature: global temps. From an explanatory power perspective a theory that can only explain one low dimensional feature has less utility than one that explains more. Getting global temps correct is not enough. You need to get the regional patterns right, the diurnal range right. You need to succeed
on daily time scales, monthly, seasonal, ect. You need to get features correct OUTSIDE your
input data. For example: If I build a theory ( say a GCM) that uses historical temps to guide
its development, Then I need to test outside that feature: Does it get rain right? sea surface salinity?
average wind speeds? If a theory of the climate ( say the sun did it or the system is self regulating) is
built on, or refers to, or is trained to temperature, then it must predict features beyond temperature
or it has missing physics. That is why when scafetta build a model of temperature, my question is
“what does you model predict for the land/ocean contrast?” what does it predict for changes in temperature at the stratosphere? What does it predict for el nino frequency. With a GCM back theory
we can ask all these questions. yes the models are built upon and refer to temperature data. That is why
the best tests are those that look at features not “baked in” to the temperature.
We are left with this.
There is one theory that aims at completeness. As incomplete as it is, as imperfect as it is, it is the only game in town. There is no consistent doubting of it. That is, no one has demonstrated the ability to consistently doubt it. At some point they express a belief in something else. And the evidence for what they chose to believe is always less secure, less comprehensive and more narrow than the evidence
for the existing paradigm which they reject. In short, their skepticism is selective and biased. It is never rigorous and consistent.
Further folks who have tried to replace the theory have failed. failed miserably.
Science has two movements: a critical movement and a constructive movement. It is not enough to
criticize the existing theory one must at some point replace it with a better theory: better in all regards.
Pressure wouldn’t be expected to correlate with 11-year cycle sun spot activity.
In a static atmosphere, the pressure on the surface is just the weight of a vertical column of air divided by the cross-sectional area of the column.
There is no reason in standard physics that sun spots would modulate this.
Willis, I managed to establish that you can get a more detailed spectrum:
theanswer=c(rep(0,runstart-1),sapply(seq(runstart,runend,by=0.25), ….
however, the output then needs scaling and it seems to offset the freq spectrum by 1/8 . “go figure”. That why I refuse to do battle with R.
I dumped the data out a text file and plotted it, rescaled, in gnuplot and it matches nicely and fills in the detail instead of clunky angular peaks.
It may be worth doing the higher res just in the shorter periods to avoid slowing down and already slow process but it gives good results.
If you manage to get it to do that cleanly in R , please post an update. This is a useful tool.
9 Year lunar cycle…
Do you mean the 19 year cycle?
I can offer a 19 year summer rainfall region cycle which is evident in Southern Africa – excluding Cape Town. The winter rainfall area which includes Cape Town has a 10 year cycle for which there is 400 years of data. The 10 year ‘drought cycle’ is visible by using time series analysis. It is a sine wave.
Konrad says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:01 pm
Thanks, Konrad. First, that’s not what Christopher said, he didn’t mention thermoregulation.
Next, the oceans don’t prevent a 1 year cycle in temperature, why would they prevent an 11-year cycle?
w.
So let me dissect Kim’s comment: “Well, Pamela, why should the oceans do that even if they could? Without an external driver, the excursions would peter out.”
Point 1: Her first question is rather silly. It’s like asking why does grass grow or not. She should know because the reasons are basic Earth Science knowledge she should possess. The oceans will absorb, under static clear sky conditions, whatever the Sun provides, especially at the equator with the Sun directly overhead. Measure that absorption each time under the same conditions and you will get the same result. However, any change in intrinsic Earth bound factors will change solar insolation which of course changes how much the ocean absorbs. Intrinsic factors include trade winds and related pressure systems driving short and long term cloudiness, seasonal axil tilt, long term orbit wobble, and changes in short and long term clear sky conditions related to aerosols. These factors let in and reflect away SWIR such that the oceans discharge and recharge energy.
Point 2: Her second comment about not having an external driver is equally silly. I hope beyond hope that not a single person here considers turning off the Sun to be a valid part of their argument regarding temperature trend drivers here on Earth.
There have been no solar cycles between 10.6 and 11.2 years since records began, according to Wikipedia – although the mean is 11.1 years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_solar_cycles
::sigh:: Look guys yes it is clear that the sun has a role in climate and weather. IE if you turned it off the earth wouldn’t do so well. That said its effects appear to be well and truly integrated into the climate mechanism in a way that minor variations from sun spots don’t make obvious changes.
This doesn’t mean that there is nothing to be found it just means we haven’t figured out where such might show up. Willis did a good job of showing the current data doesn’t reflect a correlation to sun spot activity. What he hasn’t claimed is that the sun doesn’t play a role just that he hasn’t found where beyond providing energy to fuel the entire system that role is.
Again it appears that the sun is such a huge factor in powering things that minor changes in it’s output are not easily reflected in the earths climate system. Likely because the earths system has been running for quite some time and minor fluctuations have smoothed out.
It is also possible that ocean oscillations are not just randomly masking solar-cycle effects but are systematically masking them. This could happen under Curry’s “stadium wave” theory if the wave is being pulsed by the solar cycle and the timing is such that the surface temperature wave is anti-phase with solar max.
I seem bent on misspelling axle by typing axil. Too bad my fingers don’t have little brains in each tip.
[The effect has affected your spelling. ~mod]
joeldshore says:
May 24, 2014 at 6:36 pm
Thanks, Joel, always good to hear from you.
Actually, I didn’t design this as a “clear test of the dominant paradigm.” And it is not a very good test for that. I’ve shown elsewhere that the models are just linear transformation machines, merely transforming and lagging their inputs and as such are not chaotic in the slightest.
See, the dominant paradigm merely says that the response to forcing will be linear. And given the size of the swing in TSI, that’s very small, barely enough to affect the temperature. So it’s not the best test of the prevailing paradigm. In addition, a number of the models don’t include the solar variations.
Instead, I designed this as a test of the “It’s the sun, stupid!” paradigm, which says that there is a large unknown amplification factor that amplifies the solar variations to the point where they DO significantly affect the temperature.
Perhaps the best test using the climate models of the current paradigm would be to look at what happens when the forcing goes up over a period of time, and compare the model results to the real world temperatures … oh, wait … we just did that, and the current paradigm failed most spectacularly …
In any case, with that as prologue, here’s the periodogram of the CCSM3 climate model forcing and response. It’s the only one I can find where the ~10-year solar swing is visible in the forcing … and as you might imagine, since the GCMs merely linearly transform and lag the data, it’s visible in the responses, the two periodograms are quite similar in the 2-20 year range …
Best regards,
w.
Steven Mosher says:
May 25, 2014 at 9:28 am: [ “1. …2. …” ]
Steven, where am I? I believed in AGW in the late ’90’s. The planet seemed to be confirming it. But I changed my mind based on more recent data. Now I strongly question that CO2 has more than a minuscule effect on global T.
Where are you, Steven? Based on truly scanty evidence, you are still a firm believer that CO2 is the major cause of global warming.
You don’t like it that global warming has stopped. That disrupts your “theory” [which is really only a conjecture, due to the lack of measurable supporting data].
You are not the least bit skeptical. You just know that CO2 is the most important forcing. But as Willis has written, real world evidence shows that CO2 is only a 3rd-order forcing. It is swamped by seond- and first-order forcings.
If you go by empirical measurements, there is very little data showing that human emitted CO2 does what you believe it does. I think CO2 has a minor effect on T, but that effect is too small to sort out from natural variability.
The reason I am skeptical of the carbon scare is because Planet Earth is telling us that CO2 simply doesn’t matter. At most, it adds a few tenths of a degree of beneficial warmth. So where are folks like me in your classification system?
Alec, okay. So prove it. “Anti-phase” and/or “systematically masking” should show up in the observations. And I am talking about the observations that matter. To me that means that the 11-year solar cycle TSI effect on Earth’s temperature observations doesn’t matter. It is mathematically calculable but not directly observable in nature.
Here is the rub folks. Most, if not all, of these solar theories depend on some kind of Earth-bound huge amplification(s) effect(s) strong enough to carry the tiny solar initiation signal through to the much larger temperature trend. And the fact that there is no discernable observable pattern (when reliable and valid statistical analysis is done to the collected observations) working back to that solar parameter, seals the deal against the speculation. Add to that a high rate of missing plausible mechanisms, and I am about to give up and give in to this gnawing feeling that somewhere along the line, science instruction has failed.
John says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:42 pm
John, as I mentioned above, that Parana River study has fatal flaws. I dis-assembled it here.
w.
David Archibald:
Perhaps because Willis likes to see the evidence with his own eyes rather than accept the claims of others? Which is what people call skepticism (Patron Saint: Thomas).
Also, Willis would seem to care whether there is a substantive correlation between solar variation and atmospheric data before worrying what can cause the effect.
Mosher says
It is not enough tocriticize the existing theory one must at some point replace it with a better theory:
It IS enough.
It is not necessary to provide a better theory to show a given theory wrong.
What is wrong with “at the current time we don’t know” ?
TSI seems to explain the LIA.
dbstealey, are you just trying to poke the Irish badger in me???? Do you not read anything of history????????????? Gawd!
Mosher,
Let me go further though. Suppose natural ocean cycle warming and cooling was disregarded and the warming part of one cycle was imputed to CO2 instead of to the ocean cycles? You would get exactly what we have now. When the cycle ends its warming phase you see no warming for a while and eventually cooling will show up.
Do all models show ocean cycles? Have the ocean cycles been included in the models if they do not arise naturally from model construction?
How is that for a theory?
Steven Mosher says:
May 25, 2014 at 9:28 am
Go read Tomas’ piece at Curry’s.
Now go back and read it again, and understand it this time.
Alex E says:
May 24, 2014 at 3:45 pm
Alex, as I mentioned several times, my method has no problem finding variable cycles. Look at Figures 1 and 2. The sunspot cycles (as you point out) vary from 9 to 15 years, but despite that, they show up clearly in Figs 1&2, bold as brass …
Since my method finds those various sunspot cycles in the sun, why would it have trouble finding the same cycles on earth if they existed?
I appreciate the thought, but claims without citations are useless here, Alex. What study and where did they look at that link?
Thanks,
w.
Harold says:
May 25, 2014 at 10:23 am
Steven Mosher says:
May 25, 2014 at 9:28 am
Go read Tomas’ piece at Curry’s.
Was this the one you were referring to?
http://judithcurry.com/2014/05/23/how-simple-is-simple/
Steven Mosher says:
May 25, 2014 at 9:28 am
===
LOL…..Mosh you’re a hoot
Dancing with your strawmen again
What about the ones that think it’s all a huge load…and we’ve not smart enough to know any of it….that is without faking numbers
So, say Karl Marx had remained an unknown kook and his book never published. No Marxism, no commies, no central planning in Russia, no Mao, no lust for a new tax and spend idea for the U.S. Democrat Party and or the United Nations. No Mike Mann, No James Hansen, no computer code master to fudge the tax money out of our pockets. With this other history would any one have needed to fudge the temp’s or acuse man of being the cause. Would the current temp’s still be flat lined as they are. Would the next 1,000 years of temps still be set by the solar system together with the earth system as it did in the last 1,000,000 or the next 1,000,000.
Man has a way to big of an collective ego and seeks to see all from that ego’s point of view.
The earth being a non thinking operation it just goes about like Marx never existed.
Yet there stand the windmills, spinning or possible not spinning.
Phil’s Dad: I feel that is not an accurate reading of Roger Sowell’s original assertion;
“Do we actually need a proven, causal mechanism before it is prudent to act?”.
Fair enough.
The catastrophists’ claim for “prudence” depends on a mechanism without a complete case for an effect, whereas Roger Sowell’s claim for “prudence” depends on a correlation without a complete case for any mechanism. Given the state of knowledge and the state of ignorance about all the dynamic processes that affect climate (or that constitute weather), my view of “prudence” gives some weight to both inadequate scientific arguments. But mostly I think “prudence” for now should focus on actions that will be necessary whether there is a rise or fall in the mean temperature: better flood control and irrigation, better protection of shores against storms, and other things. You do not have to believe in any climate theory in particular to think that New Orleans should seriously consider: (1) reforestation of its outlying, especially seaward, deforested regions; (2) unstraightening its ship channel; (3) building flood control walls seated deeper in the ground than before; (4) putting its emergency electricity generators above previously recorded flood extremes; (5) relocating its city-owned vehicles away from flood-prone parking lots. You can easily write recommendations like that about nearly any region on Earth. This whole debate is distracting people’s attention away from the actions that are most “prudent” (imo) no matter what the future holds.
Re My Speculation of the LIA:
Ice cores record volcanic eruptions via chemical content of aerosol material found in the ice. Atmospheric sulfur loads can be dated during the little ice age time span. How? Date the sulfur load layer in the ice cores. There was a very large eruption in the mid 1200’s, at the beginning of the early signs of the impending Little Ice Age. Largest load in fact. But from what volcano? So here is what they did. They took those grains of material from the ice core, analyzed them, and found a match with material from a still active volcano in Indonesia. The amount of sulfur compounds in the air (based on the ice core proxy) would have been enough to darken a LOT of skies, easily. And for quite some time if that volcano continued to burp and belch. Volcanic affect on insolation is huge. HUGE. Especially if that volcanic aerosol load was in the equatorial band where potential solar energy SWIR penetration into the ocean is at its greatest.
So. Cool the source of equatorial warm pools that ride the overturning circulation currents and you get very cold quickly. We saw how the North Atlantic warm current that invades the Arctic melted ice this past decade. It can do the reverse by turning cold, allowing ice expansion. That ice expansion and retraction has been calculated with regard to glacier killed plant carbon dating. Regarding plants from the Little Ice Age, glacier kill happened about the same time as that huge eruption, leading me to speculate that the warm current into the Arctic Ocean at the beginning of the Little Ice Age was cold, not warm, because the insolation at the ocean surface around the equatorial band was greatly diminished by that eruption, thus disallowing solar recharge of the upper ocean layer quite rapidly and significantly. This now much cooler water rode the overturning circulation current to the Atlantic mouth of the Arctic Ocean, leading to ice expansion, driving away the Vikings in short order from their happy homes. No solar change in TSI could have done that much damage, nor change in any other less energetic solar parameter. But changes in solar insolation regarding oceanic recharge can do that much damage.
http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/09/indonesias-samalas-volcano-may-have-kickstarted-the-little-ice-age/
Roger Sowell: The sudden aspect will be crop failures. The world has very little stored food and will be in crisis mode in roughly one year after the first major crop failure. Political upheaval will occur as hungry people act in violent ways. Medical treatment will be in short supply.
My question was not about what the threats might be, but what prudent actions should be taken now. I infer from that selection that you agree with me that agricultural research should be increased, something that will be valuable even if your predicted imminent global cooling does not come to pass. I take it from your comments about protecting the nuclear power plants that you favor improved flood control infrastructure, something that will be valuable for either cooling or warming, and something that I also support. I don’t mean that my support counts for much, but I favor local efforts toward local problems that will likely continue whether the Earth warms or cools.
More on sunspot/solar cycle signals affecting heat/convection in the upper atmosphere..
Top down meets bottom up..
Influence of solar variability on the infrared radiative cooling of
the thermosphere from 2002 to 2014
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2014GL059556/pdf
Martin G. Mlynczak1, Linda A. Hunt2, Christopher J. Mertens1, B. Thomas Marshall3,
James M. Russell III4, Thomas Woods5, R. Earl Thompson3, and Larry L. Gordley3
4. Summary and Discussion
”’We have presented 12 years of radiative cooling data associated with NO and CO2 in the Earth’s lower and middle thermosphere. The influence of the variability of the Sun during solar cycle 23 and
the first part of solar cycle 24 are evident in these data. A long and deep solar minimum previously noted is now observed in its entirety, and solar maximum conditions that are substantially weaker than the prior maximum conditions are now occurring. The deseasonalized vertically integrated cooling rates (radiated power)
appear to be more strongly correlated with changes in solar ultraviolet irradiance and geomagnetic
activity during the prior maximum than during the current maximum conditions. The influence of solar
variability is evident in both NO and CO2 cooling throughout the entire depth of the lower and
middle thermosphere.
The SABER radiative cooling data for NO and CO2 constitute a unique climate data record for testing upper atmosphere models in terms of both radiative/chemical physics and response to solar variability. One key application would be to the ongoing debate [e.g., Solomon et al., 2013] regarding the causes and consequences of the last solar minimum in 2008–2009 during which record low thermospheric densities occurred [Emmert et al., 2010]. Solomon et al. [2011] attributed the low density to changes in solar ultraviolet irradiance, while Emmert et al. [2010] conclude that other factors including composition
changes must play a role. The SABER radiative cooling data can be used to test different scenarios
on composition (atomic oxygen) changes, temperature changes, and CO2 changes to further resolve
this enigma.”’
Willis Eschenbach:
In your comment addressed to Konrad at May 25, 2014 at 9:35 am which is here you ask
Sorry, but that is a profound misunderstanding. The oceans CAUSE the “1 year cycle in temperature”.
I explained this in my above post to you at May 25, 2014 at 12:34 am which is here where I wrote
Clearly, the oceanic heat sink is so great that the difference between its magnitudes in the NH and SH completely swamps the effect of the change to the Earth’s absorbtion of solar radiation induced by Earth’s varying distance from the Sun around its elliptical orbit. Clearly, so large a heat-sink effect can – at least in principle – smooth the smaller effect of a putative variation in solar radiation.
Richard
@Willis
Try Solar Activity and Climate – Hiroko Miyahara, The University of Tokyo
Better copy of slides.
Mods:
The WordPress problems continue. I have twice attempted to send a post to this thread and both attempts have vanished. Please let me know if neither is in the ‘bin’.
Richard
@Willis,
Sorry, wrong slides. Here: Decadal Variations of Solar Magnetic Field, Heliosphere and the Cosmic Rays, and their Impact on Climate Change
Roger Sowell says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:12 pm
Well, no. It is widely believed that climate gets cold when sunspots disappear, but I wouldn’t say in was “well-known”. In my opinion the data is far from being complete, clear, or convincing.
One reason I say that is because the according to accepted ideas of solar evolution, the sun has warmed by about 5% in the last half billion years. If the global temperature actually followed the solar input, it would have resulted in a global warming of about 5%, or about 15°C (27°F) … and obviously, that hasn’t happened.
Another reason I say it is believed rather than known is that both the sunspot data and the temperature data from back around 1650 is … well … sketchy.
Another reason I say that is shown in the graph I gave above, viz:
The red line shows the longer-term variation of the sunspots … are you seriously claiming that the global temperature data looks anything like that? We should have been cooling since 1960 if that were the case …
Another reason I say it (obviously) is the lack of an 11-year cycle in any climate data. Why should a system respond to a small, slow change in some variable when it is apparently immune to a much larger and somewhat slower change in the same variable?
Not sure what you mean by “act” … I can already see James Hansen getting arrested at the protests at the White House:
w.
Steven Mosher: It is not enough to criticize the existing theory one must at some point replace it with a better theory: better in all regards.
Not enough for what? If a public policy is advocated on the basis of an “existing” theory that has a history of incorrect predictions and is full of holes besides, it is very worthwhile to point out the liabilities. Just because it will take another 2 to 6 decades to create a reasonably accurate theory is no reason to act as though the only theory that we have is reasonably accurate.
As Roger Sowell and others point out, we have a multiplicity of threats, and a prima facie case that cooling is at least as likely and at least as threatening as warming. The prima facie case for warming and the prima facie case for cooling are both full of holes when considered in detail, but it is not true that we have a single “the existing theory”.
I wonder how I fit into your classification scheme: I believe a bunch of stuff and disbelieve a bunch of other stuff. Both the sunspot cycle and the absorption/emission spectra of H2O and CO2 have been well-studied, and I believe a bunch of propositions about them; the case that either affects climate change isn’t equally well supported by evidence, and I don’t believe any quantitative claims about either, though I also don’t think either has been totally discredited by evidence to date. I support research to find out how the “holes” in the evidence get filled, and I oppose using either of them exclusively as the basis of policy and investment decisions. Quantitatively, the evidence seems to support small estimates of the effects of sunspot cycles and anthropogenic CO2 since WWII, as far as I can tell now.
How about anyone else? Is your scheme any good at all in classifying any actual people?
Roger Sowell says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:12 pm
That passes for “evidence” in your world? Here’s Perry’s description of the gyre:
So one rotation of the gyre “could take approximately 9-12 years” and sunspot cycles are 9-15 years … and? Are you truly claiming that coincidence is significant?
The Perry paper has a number of other problems, I should probably do a post on it. Here’s their hypothesis:
Now … look at the units on that graph. Their claim is that when the annual solar irradiation goes up and down by three hundredths of a watt per square meter … that four years later, this by now four-year-old change of 0.03 W/m2 somehow affects the rain in the Pacific Northwest … … …
Sorry, Roger, but that doesn’t even pass the laugh test. Three hundredths of a watt per square meter forcing a change in rainfall four years later?
And sadly, this is typical of the arguments in favor of the 11-year solar/climate connection. In your citation, they’ve searched and searched, using different lag times and different localities, until they find some chance correlation, and then claimed it proved their case.
Sorry, not impressed.
Best regards,
w.
I read the item with interest , but without feeling that I had anything to contribute to the debate , until I started reading an archaeological study guide on the use of GPS in surveys ( using the USDOD satellites).
A request was made in the WUWT article for any evidence of geophysical periodicity around 11 years ( the mean sunspot cycle). What I read in the study guide, talking about errors in GPS signal was the following:——–
Error sources are variable; here are some of the more commonly occurring:
• Ionospheric delays. The ionosphere is the upper layer of the atmosphere
ranging in altitude from 50 to 500 km. It consists largely of ionized particles
which cause a disturbing effect on the GPS signals. Since the density of the
ionosphere is affected by the sun there is less ionospheric influence during
night time. The ionosphere has also a cyclical period of 11 years which
reaches a maximum and a minimum of the magnitude of its effect. For the
current cycle, it reached its maximum in 1998 and its minimum in 2004.
—————————————————————————————————–
I do not know if the ionosphere could have any influence on global warming or its current suspension but if it does its density is going to be at a minimum in 2015 +/- 1or 2 years.
Stuart says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:14 pm
Thanks, Stuart. Actually, because the clouds reflect some 20% of incoming energy, there’s always plenty of reserve power to heat the system back up again. When the system is cool, tropical clouds simply form on average a bit later, and that allows a huge amount of energy into the system.
w.
So Mike. Are you waiting for someone else to tell you if the ionosphere has any top-down influence on weather over the long term (which is where we get our “climate” warming statistic from)?
Remember most of the suns influence on temperature records over the 11 year solar cycle is dampened out by Stevenson screens and shielded from direct sunlight, they are even oriented facing north to prevent direct sunlight falling on the thermometers.
Why is it assumed that temperature records contain a physical wattage of solar variability when it is clear that the process of measuring temperature removes it, it is continually claimed that the 11 year cycle solar variability is accounted for, but is it?.
There are direct sunlight measurements and It shouldn’t be too difficult to add the solar radiation flux density (W/m2) back onto the temperature record to compensate for the removal of direct sunlight.
Here is some reading material for you Mike. http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/09/indonesias-samalas-volcano-may-have-kickstarted-the-little-ice-age/
Oops. Wrong link. Just type this into your search engine.
The Ionosphere – Space Environment Center – NOAA
One more try Mike:
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/info/Iono.pdf
Kudos, Willis for finding nothing, reporting it, and generating a great discussion.
Pamela
We were discussing that 1257 reference yesterday
http://judithcurry.com/2014/05/23/how-simple-is-simple/#comment-568157
The assertion is complete nonsense. It is difficult from observational evidence to see the effects of even very large volcanos lasting more than a few months let alone precipitating the lia
Tonyb
I hate pasting a shortcut but I can’t figure out any other way to cut and paste an article. This one is on ionosphere cooling trends.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CDoQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.earth-prints.org%2Fbitstream%2F2122%2F810%2F1%2F06Bremer.pdf&ei=vkuCU_bbEdGkyATx_YHIDQ&usg=AFQjCNG41qEw2NVtpYW3EF-tleKJRkKsnA
Keith says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:19 pm
Thanks, Keith. Prof. Alexander talks at length about his study, but never links to it … which always makes me nervous. In any case, the study he discusses depends on an earlier study of his, which is here …
Among other problems with that study, there is his treatment of the sunspot data …
He’s taken the data and arbitrarily decided that half of it should be negative … bizarre. On my planet, such a huge alteration of the data would require some justification, but he provides none. He goes on to say:
Deciding that half of the data really should be negative rather than positive is a “graphical datum change” that doesn’t affect the interpretations? Really? He hasn’t even explained how he did it. He says that “sunspot numbers in the alternating sunspot cycles were therefore given negative values,” but that leaves unanswered the question of the end points of the cycle … do both of them get flipped, or only one of them, and if so which one, or do neither of them get flipped.
In any case, I just checked his first claim, that the Vaal River flows have a 21-year periodicity … sorry. Using his own data, they have an 18-19 year periodicity, what we used to call “close, but no cigar”. I note that Prof. Alexander says:
And given how badly his first claim performs, I can see why he wouldn’t want to use ugly old mathematics on his data … it might not give the desired results.
I may look into his paper further, but I fear there’s no “there” there …
w.
Willis Eschenbach:
In your comment addressed to Konrad at May 25, 2014 at 9:35 am which is here you ask
Sorry, but that is a profound misunderstanding. The oceans CAUSE the “1 year cycle in temperature”.
I explained this in my above post to you at May 25, 2014 at 12:34 am which is here where I wrote
Clearly, the oceanic heat sink is so great that the difference between its magnitudes in the NH and SH completely swamps the effect of the change to the Earth’s absorbtion of solar radiation induced by Earth’s varying distance from the Sun around its elliptical orbit. And, also clearly, so large a heat-sink effect can – at least in principle – smooth the smaller effect of a putative variation in solar radiation.
Richard
Here I’ve taken the output from Willis’ SFT for Tahiti SLP and SSN , scaled to be comparable around the 11 year peaks:
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=946
The match of peak frequencies is very close . Also notable is the probably lunar peak at 9 years.
As I have been saying for some time, one of the main reasons solar signal cannot be clearly identified and appears to go in and out of phase is because it is mixing with comparable lunar signal.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/2013/03/01/61/
” The presence of this strong 9 year cycle will confound attempts to detect the solar signal unless it is recognised. When the two are in phase (working together) the lunar effect will give an exaggerated impression of the scale of the solar signal and when they are out of phase the direct relationship between SSN and temperatures breaks down, leading many to conclude that any such linkage is erroneous or a matter of wishful thinking by less objective observers.”
Willis has succeeded in finding the illusive solar signal. My guess is, if it’s present in SLP in the middle of the Pacific, that won’t be only place it is.
Now, it should be noted that it’s does not stand out as clearly as it does in SSN where the 11y triplet is clearly the main show.
The three peaks have a combined amplitude of 140 , on a scale where the annual variation is 500 (arbitrary units). so it’s not digging around in weeds either.
This all invites further study ( please send next years funding ) . How does the phase compare to the solar variation. Is this a direct reflection of a solar induced change SST , for example, or is it a manifestation of a tropical atmospheric feedback which is cancelling the change in solar ‘forcing’. ?
It raises lots of interesting questions but at least we now know what it looks like so we can analyse it, see where it comes from how large it is and what it means.
Thanks again to Willis for the SFT code. This is would not have been possible with standard Fourier tools which need continuous data.
Willis:
I have repeatedly tried to make a post without success over the past 2 hours. My posts to this thread vanish. I have posted a comment to the Mods. It remains to be seen if this post appears.
Richard
[Nothing (right now) is in the “to be checked” queue. .mod]
If the Sun doesn’t warm you enough, here’s a Tribute to our Veterans for Memorial Day.
Watch -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIZG0EcJJUs Larry’s dead-on impression of Ray Charles singing ‘America the Beautiful’
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 25, 2014 at 1:21 pm
Keith, just took a look at the cross-correlation function for the sunspots (flipped using Prof. Alexander’s method) and the Vaal River data from his paper … pathetic. Heck, the correlation with no lag is negative, go figure. And at no lag does the correlation exceed 0.2, not statistically significant.
w.
BruceC says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:25 pm
As a ham myself (H44WE), I can only agree with that … as I’ve said many times, I’d be more than happy to find a corresponding correlation with the climate. Just haven’t been able to find it …
w.
From Sparks on May 25, 2014 at 12:34 pm:
The Sun is basically THE thing supplying new energy to the land+sea system, nothing else comes close. It warms the land and the oceans, which in turn warms the air. Our temperature records are overwhelmingly measurements of air temperatures.
With an 11 yr solar cycle, that would mean several years of peak warming alternating with several years of depressed warming, with several years of ramping up or down between.
So apparently you are saying the effects of elements of the ongoing solar variations that have durations of several years on air temperatures, are being removed by shielding the measuring instruments from daily and transient heating effects that would prevent them from accurately measuring air temperatures.
By making the air temperature readings as accurate as possible, you remove the 11-yr solar cycle variability signal.
Is that a reasonable summary of what you said? The signal goes away when you take better measurements?
Bill H says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:27 pm
Thanks for the ideas, Bill. Actually, you haven’t given me enough detail to beat on. What is “magnetic output in the 0.6µm band”? A citation to the “waning output” would be very valuable here.
Next, you say “this has not only affected the sunspots themselves but it affects general output” … what is “this”? How has it “affected the sunspots”? What is “general output”?
Next, why would any of this “render the 11-year cycle mute”? The 11-year cycle goes up and down no matter what the balance between 0.6µm and 1.2µm might be, and both the 0.6µm and 1.2µm “magnetic output” (whatever that might be) goes up and down on the same cycle.
Bill, you and others seem to believe in action at long range. By that, I mean you think that there can be a century-long effect without a decadal effect. The part that people forget is that nothing has a “long-term effect”—things only affect each other now, and the “long-term effect” is merely the average of instantaneous effects.
This is why I keep asking the following question:
No immediate effect = no cumulative effect and no average effect, at least on my planet … but I’m happy to hear alternative explanations.
All the best,
w.
“As a ham myself (H44WE), I can only agree with that … as I’ve said many times, I’d be more than happy to find a corresponding correlation with the climate. Just haven’t been able to find it …”
Well you just have found one effect on climate. An atmospheric one. It’s also atmospheric conditions that favour long distance radio.
Monckton of Brenchley says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:56 pm
Thanks, Christopher. You reported the purported link found by Herschel as though it were indeed a fact, without any apparent attempt to determine whether Herschel was right. In other words, you took Hershel’s word for it, which even he had counseled against … which is why I tweaked you with “Nullius In Verba” …
That is exactly what I said up above, that the emergent thermoregulatory phenomena make the system quite insensitive to changes in forcing. I agree with you that that is the reason we don’t see such 11-year cycles in climate datasets. At this point, however, I’m just trying to get agreement that such 11-year cycles are NOT apparent in the climate records …
My best to you.
w.
PS—Lord Monckton is (was?) the grand gorgonzola of the Scottish branch of UKIP, the United Kingdom Independence Party, which have just scored extremely impressive gains in the latest elections. My congratulations and best wishes to him for these wins, and for the further success of UKIP.
Konrad says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:01 pm
“Thermoregulatory effect of the oceans”? Sorry, Konrad, but it’s not at all clear what that might mean.
I think you may mean “thermal inertia of the oceans”, but if so, the thermal inertia of all of the northern hemisphere oceans put together doesn’t prevent the NH from swinging by 13° every six months … so I have a hard time believing it wouldn’t allow a swing of a few degrees over 11 years.
w.
@ Eschenbach,
“Sorry, not impressed. Best regards, w.”
I don’t really care if you are impressed, or not. You claimed to be searching, in vain, for climate-related signals with an 11-year cycle.
To quote your exact words,
“I invite those that believe that “It’s the sun, stupid” to show us the terrestrial climate record that has any sign of being correlated with the 11-year sunspot cycles.”
Thinking that perhaps you were serious, and not asking a rhetorical question, taking you at your word, I provided exactly that to you, not my own research, but from a peer-reviewed and published paper by a real scientist. You can scoff at that, as you like. By the way, the Perry paper was merely the first one I found from a 10 second internet search this morning. If you bothered to do a little digging, perhaps you would find the other 11-year cycles in the literature. Or not.
Perry did state a range of 9-12 years for the gyre to rotate, but then your Figure 2 above shows prominent peaks in the center of Perry’s range, yours peaking at 10 and 11 years. Coincidence? Your call. Perhaps it is bird droppings in the Pacific that occasionally warm the water. Maybe it’s all the heat delivered by open-ocean lightning strikes. Perhaps it is hot volcanic ash falling onto the ocean. Surely it can’t be solar radiation. You claim to have lived in the Pacific, perhaps you can tell us all in your oh-so-folksy manner exactly what does heat up the ocean. If Perry is wrong, tell us why. Perry claims it is sunshine that warms the water. Prove him wrong.
And yes, the North Pacific gyre rotates at different speeds, so not all of it rotates like a phonograph record. Perry states this.
So, there you have it. Evidence, peer-reviewed and published, make of it what you will. Apparently, you will try to discredit the paper.
Eleven year climate cycle. Staring you in the face. But, in the Willis World of Wonders, that is not acceptable.
As to your other point, the evidence is clear that absence of sunspots over a prolonged period makes the Earth very cold. The evidence for historical solar minima is not debatable, nor is the resulting cold on Earth debatable. Unless, of course, you have better proof that all those historical records are flat-out wrong. I’d really love to see you try to argue that one.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=946
Thanks Greg but why bother. On this Do-not-want-to-see-anything thread all you will get is, they are so weak, they are a whopping 0,1 year off, the peaks do not show the same power, the peaks are not sharp enough or some other nonsense.
Charles Nelson says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:39 pm
I know Willis is Anthony’s best mate, and I can tell that he’s a funny, intelligent and entertaining guy because I nearly always read what he writes…but this piece should never have been put up on WUWT. It’s basically opinionated garbage.
==============================================================
I read this passage over and over but failed to see where it points out the flaws in Mr. Eschenbach’s logic. While I’m not nearly intelligent enough to offer any particular argumentation either way, I might be one among many who read this website in the hope of absorbing some interesting tidbit such as our abilities and education allow. Well-reasoned to-and-fro is very useful to those of us with no formal training in this field who are trying, over time, to piece it together. Childish outbursts are not.
With due respect, your post does you no credit nor anyone else any service, and I simply cannot imagine why you would write such a thing.
–dbstealey says:
May 25, 2014 at 10:00 am
Steven Mosher says:
May 25, 2014 at 9:28 am: [ “1. …2. …” ]
Steven, where am I? I believed in AGW in the late ’90′s. The planet seemed to be confirming it. But I changed my mind based on more recent data. Now I strongly question that CO2 has more than a minuscule effect on global T.
Where are you, Steven? Based on truly scanty evidence, you are still a firm believer that CO2 is the major cause of global warming.–
I think Steven point is that theory still remains and has not and will not be replaced.
I would say it remains because it is vague. According wiki regarding greenhouse effect is mostly caused by “water vapor”:
“By their percentage contribution to the greenhouse effect on Earth the four major gases are:
water vapor, 36–70%
carbon dioxide, 9–26%
methane, 4–9%
ozone, 3–7%”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect
So water vapor could be adding 70% and CO2 9%, and if CO2 is adding 9% it is somewhat minuscule. Or all the CO2 in Earth atmosphere is adding about 3 C, and when you consider the portion of CO2 below 200 ppm could adding most of this 3 C.
I would say it’s hard to disprove that if double global CO2 it will add somewhere around 1 C to global temperatures. And if doubling CO2 added only .5 C, Steven would probably still claim the theory is close enough.
Or because theory is so vague, one could still rationalize it.
And if after 100 years CO2 goes from 280 ppm to 560 ppm, the .5 C is such small amount that it’s still so small it can not measured- one could still choose to see the fingerprint of CO2.
What is falsifiable is notion that only greenhouse gas can increase global temperature. And it’s so wrong, that it believer will say, of course it’s not just greenhouse gases. So even though theory claims only greenhouse gases are able to warm Earth, and gives an exact number of 33 C of warming caused by these greenhouses gases. it is indefensible.
Anyone with any sense would therefore conclude that greenhouse theory is pseudo-science.
The malleability of theory identifies it as pseudo-science. Like any pseudo-science, greenhouse effect will continue to be believe in. Something like 70% of people believe we have been visit by space aliens- that is pseudo-science. And some people imagine, the US government is controlled
by space aliens. The difference is most people are smart enough to realize, that visited by space aliens is an idea or belief, and people aren’t serious enough about it, to expect government policy to be based upon it. But that US president will actually “check” to see if space aliens have landed, is considered “prudent” rather than stark raving mad. Though it might be political wise- and it’s funny. But for politician to need to check it out, indicates how mess up people are.
Now, I am not suggesting the Greenhouse effect theory would be “improved” by corrected the wording so it’s more vague about idea of only greenhouse gases cause 33 C of warming. That would be how politicians correct things. As do religions.
Another thing, believer of “theory” know is that one need the bulk of atmosphere [the non greenhouse gases] for the greenhouse gases to “work”. Or they don’t expect Mars with it’s thin atmosphere [which has far more CO2 than Earth’s atmosphere] to be warm. So I suppose the reasoning is the greenhouse gases need an atmosphere to warm. But then again some also claim the bulk of the atmosphere warms the greenhouse gases.
So Steven says Greenhouse Effect theory can be replaced. Or I would say, what else
can tell the kiddies?
Earth is mostly covered with deep ocean of water, the average temperature of this water is about 3 C.The ocean water of tropical ocean receives most the energy of the Sun and this vast mostly uninhabited region is about 40% of total surface area of the Earth. The surface water of ocean in tropics is warmed so as to have average temperature of over 20 C and is the dominant reason why Earth average global temperature is regarded to be around 15 C.
As the average temperature of tropics is more than 15 C, the rest of the world has average temperature of less than 15 C.
Most of land mass of Earth is in the northern hemisphere and 90% of world population lives north of the equator. Most of China and large portion of India’s population is north of tropic of Cancer- not in the tropics. And all of continental US is above the tropics. Countries such as in Europe, or Canada and Russia are more distant from the tropics and have average temperature far below 15 C. Canada and Russia have average temperature near freezing point of water.
Though Europe is warmed significantly by a large ocean current called the Gulf Stream, yet, Europe has average yearly temperature still less than 15 C.
The movement of sun during the year relative to above horizon at noon is about 46 degrees [due to tilt of earth’s axis of 23.4 degrees]. At equator the sun goes past zenith by 23 degrees during summer or winter. Whereas in London, UK [Latitude 51.5 N] at spring or fall Equinox [sun directly over equator- and all Temperate Zone day/night is equal length]. The sun is zenith [90 degree] minus 51.5 degrees. Or 38.5 degree above the horizon. At equator the sun never goes below 90 minus 23.4 degrees: so always is at least 66.6 degrees above horizon at noon.
At London one adds about 23 degrees for midsummer at noon: being 61.5 degrees above horizon [and because earth’s curvature London has longer daylight than equator] and in winter solstice it’s 15.5 degrees above horizon at noon [and shorter daylight than equator].
In Tropics sun is fairly near the zenith all year round, and Temperate Zone during it’s summer of that hemisphere, the sun also somewhat near zenith at noon. And in temperate zone with the sun higher in the sky one gets average daily temperature of summer months higher than 15 C.
Or even far north as is London, during summer it can almost be sort of like tropical weather- if it’s not too cloudy.
Konrad says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:01 pm
If that were the case, then we would see the 11-year cycle in the 0-700 metre ocean heat content (OHC). Hang on, I’m determined to follow all leads … OK, here’s the periodogram for the Levitus 0-700m quarterly OHC data …
Still looking for the 11-year cycle.
w.
PS—Contrary to your claim, DWLWIR can indeed leave the ocean warmer than when there is no DWLWIR …
Willis, you say “That is exactly what I said up above, that the emergent thermoregulatory phenomena make the system quite insensitive to changes in forcing. I agree with you that that is the reason we don’t see such 11-year cycles in climate datasets.”
If the thermoregulatory system can not erase the daily or yearly temperature variation why would it erase any eleven year cycle? I suspect that the historical climatic shifts (warm periods & little ice ages) are too chaotic to fit any set cycle period(s). There may be no single cause.
@ lgl , hey, I can only present what the data shows. Some will take note , others will remain dug-in their already made up minds. Par for the course for climate 😉
” I encourage you to employ whatever methods you want to use to expose the connection—cross-correlation, wavelet analysis, spectrum analysis, fourier analysis, the world is your lobster. ”
Another helping of lobster, sir?
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=948
Seems to be too much noise in cross-correlation to resolve the separte peaks so it comes out centred as a broad peak. But I don’t think there’s much doubt about the result.
Kalte Sonne (Cold Sun) – Many scientists now forecast cooling, perhaps an ice age
By Robert On May 20, 2014 · 21 Comments
..
Russian scientists “refute the thesis
Ulric Lyons says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:02 pm
Thanks, Ulric. Indeed, both of your graphs prove my point quite clearly. Both the aa index and the number of magnetic storms vary much more widely over the 11 year cycle than they do over a century.
w.
If one matches the IMF with temperatures one will find a strong correlation.
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 25, 2014 at 2:01 pm
Let me try and clarify. As the magnetic signature of each spot is different, the output at arraying wavelengths is different. During high solar activity most sunspots produce outputs in the .6um light spectrum. As they cool or weaken that light wave form slowly elongates down into the 1.2um band. The Sun’s output in general has shifted as well, over the last ten years. One of the papers recently was on solar dimming where they established the change from the visible spectrum to the IR (.6um to 1.2um).
The earths atmosphere treats these bands very differently: http://cnx.org/content/m41579/latest/graphics7.png
This simple shift, if math serves me well, results in a net loss to earths energy budget. As this is not part of the ‘solar cycle’ or at least not the visible one, the net change would cause an increase in cloud formation and reflection while not showing any correlation to the visible solar cycle itself. The net loss would be around 1.7W/M^2 + or – 2W/M^2. Sufficient enough to cause warming or, if a big enough shift, cooling even glaciation.
Re Levitus: “Still looking for the 11-year cycle.”
There is a peak at about 10.6 , BTW what’s that big bump at the end, scales missing? Somewhere between 21 and 22 by counting the dots.
Would it be at all near any of the peaks on this graph?
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=948
Willis does not impress me at all with the points he is trying to get across. They do not reconcile putting it nicely.
So correct Geoffry
WUWT cowboy Willis Eschenbach has an interesting post re the Gleissberg cycle. The Gleissberg cycle is a supposed quasi 80 year solar cycle taken from a few hundred years of sunspot records edit: (and also seen across the Holocene proxy record). Eschenbach claims to have found a flaw in the Gleissberg methodology but he and Gleissberg fail to understand the mechanism in the background. I have attempted to educate Eschenbach but he refused to listen, but once understood it becomes clear why the 80 year cycle is not fixed in stone. My Powerwave article shows the 2 concepts required to understand the changing nature of the Gleissberg cycle that is now backed up by authors McCracken, Beer, Steinhilber etc in their latest paper. Judging by the comments on this topic on WUWT there is no understanding of these principles. If there are any questions I will be happy to answer on the Powerwave article.
Eschenbach backing up with another article on the Gleissberg cycle…he just doesnt get it. There is no exact 80-88 year cycle, only a most common gap of 80-88 years between low points in solar
The perceived dimming is due to the energy moving from the visible bands into the IR where water in our atmosphere can then reflect, absorb, or scatter it.
Alec Rawls says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:03 pm
If your best evidence is a sketchy solar proxy reconstruction based on 10Beryllium and stretching back 11,800 years … I’d say you are short on evidence. The 10Be data from Greenland only has a correlation of about 0.07 with the 10Be data from Antarctica, and there is no sign of the 11-year cycle in either one … as a result, a number of people have raised concerns about the use of 10Be as a solar proxy. But those are not the only problems with 10Be … from your cited paper:
I’m sorry, Alec, but I find that study totally unconvincing. Do you have anything with real data instead of a multi-proxy pastiche? I mean … for example, since about 1960, the sunspot numbers have been declining, but the ocean heat content has been increasing. While I have my own considerations about the OHC data, I hardly think the error is that large … how does your hypothesis explain that one?
w.
Reading all the comments…what a confusing pile of contradicting views and “facts” !!!
holts7 says:
May 25, 2014 at 3:48 pm
Reading all the comments…what a confusing pile of contradicting views and “facts” !!!
——————————————————
Science and sausages are interesting to watch being done(made).
kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
May 25, 2014 at 1:48 pm
“By making the air temperature readings as accurate as possible, you remove the 11-yr solar cycle variability signal.”
Is that a reasonable summary of what you said? The signal goes away when you take better measurements?
Yes I suppose that is what I’m saying, and after removing the solar variability, is there a reason why the clearer solar radiation flux density (W/m2) can’t be added back onto the temperature record for an improved temperature anomaly with a more accurate solar forcing?
Oops. Getting my plots mixed up.
Here’s the Tahiti SSN power spectrum.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=949
Willis says “Thanks, Mick, but I’m not buying that explanation at all. The earth’s temperature swings on the order of 6°C peak to peak over the course of a year. Why would it not respond over an 11-year period? ”
There is approximately 90W/M^2 variation in Top of Atmosphere (ToA) solar radiation at the equator between perihelion and aphelion, which is further amplified by the Earth’s tilt. Hence the strong annual signal for Darwin, Tahiti etc. Meanwhile TSI only varies by around 2W/M^2 between solar cycle maximum and minimum. The variation to orbital mechanics far exceeds the variation due to solar cycles.
Max Hugoson says:
May 24, 2014 at 5:10 pm
Thanks, Max. Yes, I’m aware of the Svensmark study, but I’d never taken a close look, so I did that today. The claim in the paper is that “Forbush events”, which are rapid several-day decreases in cosmic rays, are accompanied by corresponding drops in daily atmospheric water vapor and cloud cover.
Now … is this connection possible? Sure. To fracture the Bard, there are more things in heaven and earth, Max, than are dreamt of in any climate philosopy …
But even if it happens, does it affect the weather? As usual, I started by going to the source, getting the actual data, and looking at it …
The “Forbush Events” are the “icicles” hanging down from the main curve. Each one represent a very quick drop in cosmic rays, followed by a few days of recovery.
Several things are evident. First, as expected, cosmic rays are well correlated with sunspots. It’s a negative correlation, cosmic rays go down as sunspots and their associated magnetic field go up.
Next, the average size of a “Forbush Event” is perhaps half the size of the ~11-year swings in the data.
And finally, like the cosmic rays themselves, the frequency of the Forbush Events is well correlated with the sunspot cycle. See Fig. 1a here for confirmation.
As a result, we’re faced with the same question. IF the level of cosmic rays has a large effect on daily weather as Svensmark claims, then why don’t we see any trace of that putative effect from the larger 11-year swing in cosmic rays?
w.
“I’m sorry, Alec, but I find that study totally unconvincing. Do you have anything with real data instead of a multi-proxy pastiche? I mean … for example, since about 1960, the sunspot numbers have been declining, but the ocean heat content has been increasing. While I have my own considerations about the OHC data, I hardly think the error is that large … how does your hypothesis explain that one?”
Ocean warming is reflected in sea level rise. One can also include removing water from underground and melting glaciers and whatever. But accurate measurement of rising sea level is a very good proxy for increasing ocean heat- in terms comparing to any other proxy.used in climate science. Or I take sea level estimates and all their complication, over ocean temperature taken from ships.with all their adjustments.
So for at least for last century, sea levels have been rising and sunspots have been increasing:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Sunspot_Numbers.png
Sea level:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Trends_in_global_average_absolute_sea_level,_1870-2008_%28US_EPA%29.png
In terms of cycles of air temperature, one look at ocean cycles, such as El Nino.
Oceans cover most of Earth. There is higher percentage of ocean in tropics, as compared to north hemisphere. And tropics 23 South to 23 North latitude receives most of energy from the Sun. And the tropical oceans absorb most the energy which is absorbed on Earth. So Earth ocean absorbs vast amounts of energy and it’s doing this over time periods of centuries.
Or turn off the sun, and oceans remain warm [average temperature of ocean is 3 C, so staying warm is remaining around the average temperature] for centuries. The atmosphere cools rapidly, as does surface of land area. So these cycles you looking for are the atmosphere and surface, which are capable of short period changes in temperature, and the ocean is not capable of such short changes [turn off sun and ocean does not change much in terms of years. And put Earth at Mercury’s orbit, and again it will take some time to warm the oceans- though surface and atmosphere will be nearly instantly be affected. So at Mercury distance the ocean will still be absorbed more energy than any other surface on Earth, but it will take centuries to get it to bath water temperature.
What is causing these ocean cycles, is the ocean being warmed by the sun. One has include circulation of less warmed [not even warmed arctic water] falling towards the heat engine at the tropics [and arctic waters being warmed by tropical water going to arctic region to replace it.
So you measuring the wrong thing. A better place to look is ocean current rates if you want any chance to measure the added heat.
MrX says:
May 24, 2014 at 6:33 pm
Mr. Anonymous, read the dang comments first. Few people think that the ~.1% change in TSI causes anything much. But there are a host of people in this very thread saying that changes in some factor that varies over an ~11-year cycle in parallel with TSI (e.g. UV, magnetism, cosmic rays, sunspots, etc.) can “amplify” the small solar changes to a level where they can affect the weather … and it is that claim that I am investigating.
w.
ZombieSymmetry says:
May 24, 2014 at 9:38 pm
Interesting question, hang on … nope. I just took a look at the periodogram of the monthly Mauna Loa CO2, no 11-year cycle.
w.
mikelorrey says:
May 24, 2014 at 9:54 pm
Because I already looked at eight global temperature records … and because I thought that perhaps an effect would be found. I’ve looked at so many putative connections that have disappeared, I’m starting to grasp at straws.
w.
“As a result, we’re faced with the same question. IF the level of cosmic rays has a large effect on daily weather as Svensmark claims, then why don’t we see any trace of that putative effect from the larger 11-year swing in cosmic rays?”
It’s not “we” don’t see any trace it’s W.E. does not see any trace because he’s got his Ray Charles shades on the and a finger firmly in each ear.
You proposed the game and even helpfully provided a useful tool and links to data. But when you find the link yourself you not only don’t notice but steadfastly refuse to see it when it’s pointed out.
I also used one of the methods you suggested people may want to try and showed even more clearly the link between SLP and SSN in case the first match was not enough for you.
Now you don’t have to reply to me if you don’t wish to, but please stop this ridiculous charade of “nope not sign here either” despite what the data shows.
“It’s The Evidence, Stupid!”
And two minutes after asking his question, mikelorrey says:
May 24, 2014 at 9:56 pm
Care to read the damn post and get off my back? I did what you ask some time ago, you unpleasant man, and I highlighted that fact in the post and linked to the analyses. Do your dang homework, Mike, and when you ask a question, give a man time to answer.
w.
” … and because I thought that perhaps an effect would be found. ”
And you were correct. And it may even be evidence of a feedback if you bother to look.
Willis asks, “If there is no immediate effect from the 11-year cycle, how can there be a long-term cumulative or average effect, when that long-term effect is nothing but the running sum or average of the immediate effect?”
This has been asked and answered by Christopher Monckton here, Monckton of Brenchley says:May 24, 2014 at 3:17 pm (4th paragraph)
David A here, May 24, 2014 at 10:33 pm and here David A says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:50 pm
and Richard Courtney here,richardscourtney says:May 25, 2014 at 1:25
So far you have neither responded or demonstrated you comprehend the thoughts suggested.
Simply put the long term cumulative effect of several, four or more anomalous solar cycles, (high or low) may be required to overwhelm other, or make clear in a GAT graph, as GAT had many disparate factors, so any one factor is not likely to have clear signal in the record. (see my May 24, 2014 at 10:50 pm comment)
if you disagree please show me any one factor that is clearly recorded repeatedly in climate records as causing a one way shift in GAT. (certainly CO2 fails this test) You have demonstrate the inconsistency in volcanic records. I dare say you can find a profound lack of consistency in any one climatic factor.
For influence on climate of solar irradiance & magnetic flux variations on various times scales:
http://www.intellicast.com/Community/Content.aspx?a=197
And a prediction:
http://www.coolingnews.com/implication-correlation-solar-activity.html
Tonyb says at May 25, 2014 at 1:13 pm
Pamela
We were discussing that 1257 reference yesterday
http://judithcurry.com/2014/05/23/how-simple-is-simple/#comment-568157. The assertion is complete nonsense. It is difficult from observational evidence to see the effects of even very large volcanos lasting more than a few months let alone precipitating the lia.”
In what part is the assertion complete nonsense? The 1257 explosion was massive. Even before the volcano responsible was identified, it was deemed the largest eruption in the past 7000 years based on ice core sulfur data.
Willis said:
“My latest foray is into the world of atmospheric pressure. I figured that the atmospheric pressure might be more sensitive to variations in something like say the solar wind than the temperature would be.”
I would see how well the series correlate at monthly scales then, it would be a far better test than looking for a simple 11yr signal.
“Thanks, Ulric. Indeed, both of your graphs prove my point quite clearly. Both the aa index and the number of magnetic storms vary much more widely over the 11 year cycle than they do over a century.”
I see that the range is from less than 30 to above 60:
http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/images/image022.jpg
David A says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:02 pm
In support of the cumulative effect is the first graph in my second link above, based on a correlation between the length of solar cycles & global temperature trends, which was examined by Danish researchers Friis-Christensen & Lassen in 1991, as extended by Shaviv. It also chances a prediction.
Willis, very simple answer. The systems we are observing are NOT strictly linear in any way shape or form. YOU YOURSELF have noted the “thunderstorm hypothesis” which mitigates matters. While an IMMEDIATE change in the ionization/seeding of clouds may produce a rather IMMEDIATE EFFECT…(such as noted by Svensmark’s paper) there are other factors (aka, think the thunderstorm hypothesis) which…with LONG TERM trends may tend to DAMPEN effects. It should be NOTED that the galaxy itself has an effect on cosmic ray intensity. We are NOT like a needle on an LP, staying in one plane in relation to the central slice through the galaxy. There is strong evidence we are cutting somewhat of a Lissajous figure, as the sun rotates around the center of the galaxy. Putting us on a cycle of going up and down with relation to the central “flat LP” of the galaxy. This TOO could have a long term effect on cosmic rays, and thus a longer term effect on clouds and the albedo.Thus, there could be an explanation for periodic ice ages. I think in ALL of this there is a fatal flaw in thinking “we” (currently, in our time, with our limitations”) can figure out ALL the variables in this multivariate system and their inter-relations.
Andrew_W says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:34 pm
True ‘dat, as the comments show … ah, well. All I can do is apply the same scientific criteria to all arguments.
w.
Willis,
Clearly earth has thermoregulatory limits, particularly cloud and storm formation, which are massively non linear, dare I say it tipping points, but they are of course negative feedbacks. I think we can take for granted that earth temperature is proven to be solar insolation dependent since day is warmer than night, summer is warmer than winter, and the tropics are warmer than the poles. I think it’s rather incontrovertible that these difference are mediated by differing insolation. The sunspot cycle is a different matter, it’s not a terribly large change, and likely below the noise floor of say, ocean mediated temperature variation. Also, the different effects from sunspots in particular may have opposing effects such that overall the climatic effects are minimised. Sunspots are a different mechanism to say orbital eccentricity so it isn’t surprising to me that a sunspot signature is difficult to discern. Have you looked for example on the effect of sunspots on volatility? Energy entering into the system can be shown as more heat OR more volatility as feedback mechanisms become more perturbed in transforming that excess incoming energy to another form – even as the average remains unchanged.
The problem of course is which feedback out of millions to look at, the logical exit point is wind/waves where most of the thermal energy in the system ends up. Since wind velocity is a square root function of energy, good luck in eeking out a wind signature given only a 1 % change in energy sqrt(.01) = .0001 change in average wind velocity.
Girma says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:54 pm
Not true. The ocean responds more in a year than the expected change from an 11-year cycle, so thermal inertia isn’t even in the equation.
w.
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/09/26/1307520110
The full color download of the volcanic eruption at the beginning of the LIA is available for free. Very interesting stuff!
Willis
Here is the indisputable correlation between sun spot count and global mean temperature (you have to take the 63 years running mean for both )
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/mean:756/normalise/plot/sidc-ssn/mean:756/normalise/from:1880
For the earth’s climate, 11 years is just noise
Willis,
Further to my last, although SS24 is one of the weakest this century, TSI during the latest (second) peak is actually slightly higher than for SS23 so the correlation between sun spot numbers and TSI is weak at best. Keep up thegood work.
David Archibald says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:54 pm
You reproduced it, you published it, you claimed it was right … you live with the ensuing hilarity. Sorry, but that’s the way of the world.
Any graph missing the middle third of the data provides no “evidence” of any kind, David.
Not true in the slightest. My quest is not for a physical explanation of a putative 11-year cycle in climate data.
My quest is for evidence that such a relationship exists. People up and down this thread are claiming that such a relationship exists, and a number of mechanisms have been proposed. But until someone shows me evidence that such a relationship actually is a real thing, the explanations are premature.
I’m so glad you’ve come along to tell me what’s in my mind … in fact, none of that is true. First, I’ve made the attempt to find such a connection many times, this is my latest, making a public appeal for evidence. So why would I think someone would be a “fool for even attempting” what I’m doing myself?
Next, I do not prejudge any scientific analysis, I don’t say every study is wrong. I look at them one at a time, get the data myself, and see if their claims hold water. What else would you do?
I love the assumption that he speaks for the reader, and knows what questions the reader would ask.
Do you truly think that people out there sit around speculating about why I feel “compelled”? This is all just character assassination, no evidence, just slime.
My friend, I’m not refusing to accept a hundred papers I haven’t seen, that’s crazy talk. However, if you were to provide a link to “the papers of Solheim” so others can share your outrage, you might actually move the discussion forwards.
w.
“”””””……joeldshore says:
May 24, 2014 at 7:06 pm
george e. smith says:
BUT ! back to a recent (not so long ago) Willis essay, on some observations of a Volcanic dimming incident(s) I believe made in Hawaii (shoot me if I’m wrong Willis) where for some months, there was a measured, very significant reduction (20-25% sticks in my mind) in the SURFACE solar irradiance; that decayed exponentially over a few months to a year or so (in that region) BUT, the local temperature anomalies showed no observable temperature change at all (in that region.
It was a striking demonstration that the weather / climate feedback loop, can squelch a host of solar irradiance variation, that happens over time intervals, that are clearly much longer than the thermal time constants.
Well the day night temperature cycle proves that the thermal response can be pretty darn fast, compared to a three month SI deprivation.
So that essay of yours Willis proved to me quite solidly, that there is a very active negative feedback, temperature regulating loop in play.
Well, it might prove it to you but it certainly doesn’t to me. I can think of a ton of issues with such a test. One is the huge thermal heat capacities involved…Places like Hawaii don’t have that strong a diurnal temperature cycle as is true of more continental climates. A second issue is the neglect of the fact that climate is far from a local effect, that is there is huge heat transport around the globe. You can’t just say, “Forcing is reduced here so it should be a lot colder here.” A third is you have to figure out the extent to which that change in solar radiation reaching the surface means less solar radiation being absorbed vs the extent to which some of that radiation that didn’t reach the surface was absorbed in the atmosphere (i.e., to what extent do the volcanic aerosols reflect radiation and to what extent do they block it by absorbing it).
But, another important thing is that you are making a big confusion between changes in forcing at the surface and top-of-the-atmosphere forcings. …..”””””
Joel, I read this posting of yours about 24 hours ago, and decided it wasn’t worth responding to. But I felt that a minimum response required, was an immediate recall of the recent gold stars you seemed (at the time) to have earned.
I’m still having a hard time believing it actually is you that wrote this drivel.
Well I decided in the interests of other readers, to try and address, your post. It will be necessary to define some terms as they arise, since the seem to be an area of confusion in your mind.
The first necessary definition, is one of those words I capitalized, for emphasis; SURFACE .
For the purpose of this posting, “surface” refers to the surface of planet earth, and that is further defined as ; Any boundary, separating any bulk portion of the earth that is in a solid phase, OR a liquid phase; from a bulk portion of the earth that is in a gaseous phase.
These may be colloquially referred to as “land” , “sea”, and “air.”
In this regard, CLOUDS , consisting of liquid or solid phases, are NOT considered part of SURFACE.
So I specifically referenced “surface solar irradiance.”
That would relate to ONLY EM radiant energy, that has already made contact with any portion of the surface, as defined above.
I repeat here this portion of YOUR post: “””””…..A third is you have to figure out the extent to which that change in solar radiation reaching the surface means less solar radiation being absorbed vs the extent to which some of that radiation that didn’t reach the surface was absorbed in the atmosphere (i.e., to what extent do the volcanic aerosols reflect radiation and to what extent do they block it by absorbing it)……””””
Do you see the dilemma here Joel. All of these strawmen you here set up; well they actually are red herrings.
Not a one of these things has ANY influence on the “SURFACE solar irradiance.”
It has already landed, either on the ground, or on the oceans. It is thus immune to aerosols, volcanoes, sea level rice, ocean acidification, or any other imagined pestilence you raised. The surface solar irradiance already made it to the surface.
So now to this ditty: “””””…..One is the huge thermal heat capacities involved…Places like Hawaii don’t have that strong a diurnal temperature cycle as is true of more continental climates. …..”””””
Just for the record, Joel, I was born and raised, surrounded by water; just like Hawaii is. Actually, I was born on such a strip, about five miles wide, having the entire Pacific ocean to the East of me, and the entire Indian Ocean to the West of me. Well the Australians like to call it the Tasman Sea, near where we are, but it’s the Indian Ocean. Actually, when the sea level rises, as it does twice per day, that five miles strip, shrinks to one half of a mile; just enough to get one road, and one railway track through on dry land. And no we are not near ANY continents.
And I can assure you Joel, that the temperature does change between day and night. Now admittedly, it is not as large as the 150 degree C change, one can experience by flying from the winter midnight of the Antarctic highlands, to the hot summer daylight deserts of North Africa.
But that day-night Temperature change (I mentioned above) is huge compared to the pitiful about 0.7 deg. C change that people are still trying to verify as having occurred on earth over the last 150 years.
Did you catch this part Joel ?
“””””…..that happens over time intervals, that are clearly much longer than the thermal time constants…..””””
Now I understand that you educators like to treat the climate, as a steady state condition. Note how Kevin Trenberth, et al’s “earth energy budget.” is a static steady state condition with no time element involved.
Like you, he probably has no understanding of a THERMAL TIME CONSTANT (which I mentioned above, and YOU chose to simply ignore, with this offering :
“””””…..One is the huge thermal heat capacities involved…”””””
Now Joel, you may not be aware of this; but ALL of those numbers, on KT’s “earth energy budget.” are NOT ENERGIES at all. The SI unit of energy, is the JOULE.
Watts is a unit of POWER, often defined as a RATE of doing work. It is an instantaneous “differential” quantity, which for a constant power, gives the same answer when observed for one atto-second, as when observed for a year.
And for the extra-terrestrial mean TSI (over the orbital year), is generally about 1366 W/m^2 areal power density. It most certainly is NOT 342 W/m^2, as asserted by KT et al.
And when you supply energy to an object at a certain rate (power), which gets converted to heat energy in that object, which has a certain “specific heat”, the temperature will tend to rise above the equilibrium steady state temperature, at a very calculable initial rate; which rate will then slow down, as “heat” loss mechanisms kick in to slow the rate of temperature rise. Such processes are characterized by (in this case) thermal time constants; that being the time it takes for a new temperature level to be reached, if the heating continued at the initial linear rate.
This is what really takes place in a dynamic transient situation, which you choose to enshroud under a flowery unscientific term like “huge thermal heat capacities.”
Now I have been to or lived in a number (small) of different places, and in every such place, when a cloud passed between me and the daytime sun, the temperature drop experienced by me, was virtually instantaneous, in the shadow zone. But then, I have a short thermal time constant, and also a negative feedback loop, called sweating, that kicks out to stop me losing body heat so fast, in the shadow.
How about this “””””…..
But, another important thing is that you are making a big confusion between changes in forcing at the surface and top-of-the-atmosphere forcings. …..”””””
Sorry Joel; I never ever use the word “forcings”, and I never used it in my post, nor did I mention forcings at the top of the atmosphere, nor did I mention changes in forcings at the top of the atmosphere; never even mentioned the top of the atmosphere. Those are all strawmen dreamed up out of your fertile imagination, Joel.
I specifically discussed “SURFACE solar irradiance.”, and as I defined “surface, that is the BOTTOM of the atmosphere, and NOT the top of the atmosphere.
Well Joel to you educators, who teach, instead of do, the climate is the (static steady state) AVERAGE OF THE WEATHER .
Don’t know how many times I have told you it is the INTEGRAL of the weather.
That is the INTEGRAL over TIME and SPACE.
So I talked about Willis’s description of a LOCAL irradiance dimming; that persisted for a time much longer than the also local, thermal time constants; and described how it was found that LOCAL negative feedbacks, served to immediately nullify (locally) the effect of that dimming, so as to cancel out any change in LOCAL surface temperature.
Nothing in my post precluded, any such change in surface solar irradiance, occurring in ANY other location, or multiplicity of locations, and local feedbacks in those locations from cancelling out such perturbations; nor extending that to the entire earth, to be both spatially and temporally integrated to produce a global condition; or regional climate changes.
In addition to knowing what it is to be surrounded by water, I also know a thing or two about volcanoes. Well I had about 60 of them, within 25 miles of where I grew up. None of them were actually active at the time; but I used to go climbing and skiing, on a more distant (200 miles) away volcano, while it WAS actively erupting. Also used to go swimming in its sulphuric acid crater lake, at other times when it wasn’t erupting.
So aerosols I do understand somewhat; but so far as I know they tend not to be found between the SURFACE and the ground; or the ocean, they are more of an atmospheric thing.
But I’m sure, I have told you before Joel, I make it a rule to never get between somebody, and a cliff they are wanting to leap off.
But if just one person, is helped to understand negative feedback in the weather system, by my comments, on Willis’s Pinatubo solar dimming description, that is a gain as far as I am concerned.
You can drag out all the red herrings you wish Joel.
But I’m disappointed in you; I was beginning to think, you were somewhat more sensible.
On a day of ego growth.
One ego did grow.
Larger still, growing.
Grown not so much.
Here is the cross-correlation function of Tahiti SLP and SSN.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=951
Nice an clear the difference between SSN leads and SSN lags ( as would be expected if there is an effect: SLP does not influence the sun! ).
The first peak is a about 30 months and is negative: more SSN , less SLP. So is that a passive effect of SSN variation or a feedback?
BTW: This is close to what is usually attributed the “quasi-biennial oscillation” QBO. Don’t know if there’s a connection.
I can see a lot of detail with solar wind speed changes which can be compared with teleconnection phases at an event level, that could be more fruitful than reducing the solar wind down to a ~11yr signal: http://snag.gy/99MpL.jpg
You could do a periodicity analysis on the daily solar wind speed data to see what cyclicity it may have, but why bother when many correlations can be checked on an event basis.
Now I have not had time think this through in detail but lower SLP would be in the sense of rain/storm conditions. Now if higher SSN : more active sun means an increased solar “forcing” of some kind that would make storm conditions a negative feedback.
Willis produced this evidence in his SFT plots , but refuses to see it , yet it seems to be observational evidence of what he has been banging on about for the last year or two.
Odd that.
Still , look like useful information.
Gotta love Willis poking the bear. Good on ya. 🙂
Resume of evidence so far:
1. 10,11,11.8 triplet in SSN ( probable 11,136 modulation )
2. same triplet found in Tahiti SLP, very close match of frequencies.
3. Very strong 10.8 y peak in cross power spectrum
4. Clear onset of circa 10.7 year pattern in SSN-SLP correlation function on positive lag side
5. First peak is negative peak at ~ 30 months lag ( SLP lagging SSN ).
30 months is just short of a quarter cycle. ( pi/2 lag ? )
6. Neg. correlation : incr. SSN => lower SLP; would indicate a negative feedback.
http://climategrog.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/tahiti_ssn_cc.png?w=843
Now that is not the surface warming everyone seems to assume but it is a climate effect linked to SSN.
I rest my case ( and my eyeballs. Far too much screen time today ).
Ed Bray says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:59 pm
Thanks, Ed. The sun indeed changes the earth’s temperature on a short-term scale. The question is whether the sun (via TSI, magnetism, cosmic rays, sunspots, solar wind, etc.) affects the global temperature on a longer-term scale (decadal or longer). I’m just looking for that evidence … without much success.
w.
[To Ed Bray:
Please check the missing/inconsistent temperature values in the following:
“Ed Bray says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:59 pm
“As I recall we lost about 20 degrees F starting from about ???F. I would estimate the temperature fall to be around120 Degrees in say about 4Hr. ” .mod]
Henk Kraa says:
May 24, 2014 at 11:04 pm
Citations, people, citations! Henk, that sounds interesting and I’m happy to look … but to do that, I need a citation to the original data.
Thanks,
w.
Mike says:
May 24, 2014 at 11:07 pm
Mike, your tone is unpleasant, your logic is absent, you provide no facts, and your citations are non-existent.
If, as you claim, you have the brilliant method to reveal the 11-year cycle, break it out and show us the data and the code. That’s what I do, and if you want to join in, that’s what you’ll have to show as well
w.
PS—you say
My friend, I don’t trust anyone, including myself. In my beloved grandmother’s words, “You can believe half of what you read, a quarter of what you hear … and an eighth of what you say” …
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 25, 2014 at 3:00 pm
—————————————-
“If that were the case, then we would see the 11-year cycle in the 0-700 metre ocean heat content (OHC). Hang on, I’m determined to follow all leads … OK, here’s the periodogram for the Levitus 0-700m quarterly OHC data …”
No, the cumulative effect cannot be found in the data at current resolution. Remember you are looking for just 0.8C in 150 years.
“PS—Contrary to your claim, DWLWIR can indeed leave the ocean warmer than when there is no DWLWIR …”
I’m sorry Willis, DWLWIR is not what is stopping our oceans freezing. DWLWIR can effect water that is very cold with no wind speed or very saturated or very cold air above. But these are not conditions found over most over the oceans. For the radiative GHE hypothesis to be correct, DWLWIR would have to effect our oceans just as if they were a “near blackbody”. That simply isn’t the case.
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 12:16 am
The sunspot cycles are in fact irregular, Greg. What’s the point in having the data if you don’t look at it? I do believe what the periodogram produces, which is the sign of a very irregular cycle. What I don’t believe is that it’s an amplitude-modulated carrier wave with two sidelobes.
So your claim is that the sunspot cycle, which varies from 9 to 15 years, is a “strong regular signal” plus noise? That doesn’t pass the laugh test.
I said there is no regular signal in the sunspots, Greg, because there isn’t one. The cycle lengths vary, with no apparent pattern. Where is your regular signal?
w.
a.m. :”Chief among the dang facts is that despite looking in a whole lot of places, I never could find any trace of the 11-year sunspot cycle in any climate records. And believe me, I’ve looked.”
……
May 25, 2014 at 6:29 pm:
“The question is whether the sun (via TSI, magnetism, cosmic rays, sunspots, solar wind, etc.) affects the global temperature on a longer-term scale (decadal or longer). I’m just looking for that evidence … without much success.”
Whoosh! was that a goal post the just flashed before my eyes? It did look a lot like one but it was so fast that I can’t be sure ! LOL
Now my thinking is that if SLP is a feedback it has to be reacting to something. SST would be the first thing to think of. Even a strong non-linear feedback needs a cause. If not maybe some direction causation needs to be sought.
I’m also thinking that the tropics are very stable, self-regulating, extra-tropics less so. Perhaps we can see a solar signal in some SST basins.
circa 11y signal weak in Nino regions SST:
http://climategrog.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/icoads_pds_nino_grp1.png
stronger in north and south Atlantic.
http://climategrog.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/icoads_pds_9_grp.png
The relative strength of the lunar signal is clear in that last graph. Which is why you won’t see clear solar cycle unless you look properly, ie without the Ray Charles eye apparel.
richardscourtney: Willis Eschenbach:
In your comment addressed to Konrad at May 25, 2014 at 9:35 am which is here you ask
the oceans don’t prevent a 1 year cycle in temperature, why would they prevent an 11-year cycle?
Sorry, but that is a profound misunderstanding. The oceans CAUSE the “1 year cycle in temperature”.
I explained this in my above post to you at May 25, 2014 at 12:34 am which is here where I wrote
The reason for the global seasonal temperature change is the different coverage of Northern hemisphere (NH) and Southern hemisphere (SH) by water (land is not as good a heat sink as water) so the seasonal variation is greater in the NH than the SH. This support’s Monckton’s claim of a great oceanic heat sink effect.
Isn’t it *both* the differential sea surface area and the change in total insolation from perihehelion to aphelion?
“What I don’t believe is that it’s an amplitude-modulated carrier wave with two sidelobes.”
Well lsvalgaard seems convinced it is a sign of modulation and says there is theoretical basis for such a modulation ( beyond what is suggested by the power spectrum ).
“I said there is no regular signal in the sunspots, Greg, because there isn’t one. The cycle lengths vary, with no apparent pattern. Where is your regular signal?”
Your software fits regular signals. The major components ARE regular signals yet you say ” there is no regular signal in the sunspots,”
Sure the “length” of the dips in the time series is variable because your can’t even properly define when a cycle starts or ends and there’s a lot of minor periodicites (noise or otherwise) then can push both troughs and peaks back and forth.
The whole point of spectral analysis is to untangle that visual mess of the time series and see whether there is any structure to it. You did that, you demonstrate it’s there yet for some reason don’t “believe” that it’s there.
Seems odd to me.
Willis;
Here is some more food for thought.
http://www.climate4you.com/images/CloudCoverAllLevel%20AndWaterColumnSince1983.gif
One of the aspects noted is the shift of mid level clouds as the lower 1.2um band interacts with water in the mid troposphere. You will not the shift and increase of these clouds much higher in the atmosphere which reflects much more heat than lower level clouds.
I am trying to find a good spectral analysis over time to show the shift in solar output within bands.
“The cycle lengths vary, with no apparent pattern.”
Is that your sticking point? It’s apparent that there’s a rough cycle. A bit more a bit less but it does not run off even over hundreds of years.
The reason for spectral techniques is help analyse that which is not always “apparent” or to determine whether some that ‘appears’ to be happening really is , and it’s not the mind seeing faces in the the clouds.
In fact if you try to model SSN it’s not cos ( 130years ) * cos ( 11 years ) it’s more like abs( cos ( 130years ) * cos ( 22 years ) ). When you FFT that or SFT that it has to fit twice the frequency.
You spoke last time about doing SFT with other functions. I think this would be a good subject for such a test. I may give it a try tomorrow but I’ve done enough for one day.
In fact I will because there’s a lot of this climate data that seems to be abs(cos) rather than purely harmonic. Now I have the code, I’ll try hacking it about at bit.
I think at least 3 people have mentioned some form of the suggestion that the earth may be a low-pass filter. This was the only response I saw to that idea:
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 24, 2014 at 4:20 pm
…..
Thanks, Mick, but I’m not buying that explanation at all. The earth’s temperature swings on the order of 6°C peak to peak over the course of a year. Why would it not respond over an 11-year period?
…..
This does not convince me that the earth-as-a-low-pass-filter explanation is wrong. A much higher amplitude signal could get through a low-pass filter, even if its frequency is higher. Low-pass does not mean it stops all higher frequency signals regardless of amplitude. It attenuates the signal, but if the signal has a high enough amplitude, it can get through.
The feasibility of the solar theory can be defended (I think) by saying that the 11 year cycle has a low enough amplitude, and a high enough frequency, to be completely filtered. The very long term solar cycle (involving the Maunder Minimum) has a much lower frequency (and also has a much higher amplitude, by the way), so the effect is not filtered. Again, the yearly seasonal signal referred to has the highest frequency, but has such a high amplitude that it gets through anyway, in this way of thinking.
I’ll say it again. Watch Dr. Miyohara. Cosmic Ray 22-year cycle: at 9.5 min in. Relative Humidity in Japan and Cosmic Rays, 1620-1760 AD, at 19:21 min. Strong correlation. She’s not chopped liver.
rbs – Thx for the Pustilnik et al link. Excellent.
Greg Goodman – I agree with you (and M Simon, Matthew R Marler, et al) re the unknown. Ascribing things to causes not known (aka “we don’t know”) is at the core of science. The alternative is ascribing things to the wrong causes or to invented causes.
richardscourtney : “The oceans CAUSE the “1 year cycle in temperature”. “. It’s so blindingly obvious, why didn’t I see it like that before? Thanks.
Kate Forney – re the flaws in Willis’ argument: OK, maybe Charles Nelson didn’t spell any out and was unnecessarily abusive, but there is a significant flaw in Willis’ argument. First, please note that when he says “despite looking in a whole lot of places, I never could find any trace of the 11-year sunspot cycle in any climate records “, or just about anything else for that matter, he speaks nothing but the truth. But the flaw is that he is only looking for a reasonably regular or linear type of effect. There are many reasons to suppose that the effect would not be like that, and several commenters here have given examples of observations that suggest that the effect does indeed exist. The final flaw is that these are being dismissed using arguments based on the regular/linear type of logic. For example, he dismisses one graph saying “Any graph missing the middle third of the data provides no “evidence” of any kind. Now I heartily agree that a graph missing its middle third is very dubious, and in a simple linear world it should be summarily dismissed, but in a complex coupled non-linear world it just might (no more than that) be providing a valuable clue.
Willis writes:
Whether sunspot numbers were declining post 1960 is not what matters. The average level of solar activity from the 1920’s through the end of the Twentieth Century was somewhere between high and very high. If solar magnetic activity does drive global temperature then what matters is the level of activity, not whether it is rising or falling.
Many prominent climatologists make this fallacious argument that late 20th century warming cannot have been due to the sun because solar activity was not rising over this period. Collecting examples has been one of my hobby horses. Two years ago I sent the authors of these quotes an email, suggesting that they must be assuming that by the late 1970s (the beginning of the warming that occurred during the second half of the 20th century) ocean temperatures had already equilibrated to whatever forcing effect the high level of solar activity was having. Otherwise warming would continue until equilibrium had been reached.
Of course none of them had mentioned any assumption about ocean equilibration in their analyses (as Willis does not). I was giving them an out. Their claim that warming would be caused by the change in the level of the forcing rather than by the level of the forcing is blatantly unscientific, but if they were making an unspoken assumption that the oceans equilibrate rapidly to a change in forcing then we could talk about THAT.
Yes, replied Lockwood and Solanki and several others, they WERE assuming rapid ocean equilibration (which does not stand up to the least bit of scrutiny).
As others have pointed out, there isn’t an 11 year cycle, there is a range from 9 to 15 or so. But more than that, IIRC, few of the cycles are actually AT 11 years, with the stronger nodes being both below and above that point. ( For some reason, 9.5 and 12 ish come to mind… but it’s been a long time since I saw that write up and don’t have a link at hand)
So you look for an 11 year period in data known not to have an actual 11 year period. Once again “averaging” strikes it’s fatal blow… (Averaging is used to hide things. Sometimes that is useful, like hiding noise to see the base note, but often it just hides and obscures truth. Sometimes it brings to the front something that isn’t real and doesn’t exist. Like the average person being a semi-hermaphrodite… ALWAYS be wary of anything that uses averages…)
Not just Hershel, but also Jevons found a crop price solar cycle link. Jevons went through large volumes of data from the British Empire, including a load of data from India (IIRC), but he looked at actual match to solar cycles, not to a mythical average period.
I know you love your new periodogram toy / tool, and it can be very useful for a lot of things; but do recognize that it is “exactly wrong” for looking for evidence of a VARIABLE length oscillation impact. Line up the peak or bottom of a cycle with the other variable. Wiggle match. Then you can start looking for what statistical / math tool to QA check your vision.
Ah, found a reference (it’s just doing simple math on the actual sunspot data so anyone can check it):
http://personal.inet.fi/tiede/tilmari/sunspots.html#twotypes (Timo Niroma )
That your priodogram finds an 11 year peak makes it immediately suspect. An analysis ought to find a peak at a bit under 12 years ( 11.85 ) and a touch over 10 years ( 10.25 ) but not AT 11 or 11.1 years. That your Fig. 2 finds a peak at 11 years, higher than the ones at about 10 and about 12, implies the technique “has issues”…
To then not find a fictional 11 year cycle in other data is not much of a surprise when the real mode is a wandering range of period lengths with nodes at about 10 and 12 but tending to avoid the 11 year average.
If the 11 year solar cycle has no influence on surface air temperatures, how and why is it included as a either a major forcing or basically a nonexistent forcing?
You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make him/her drink. Belief trumps data. Every time. And slows any benefit -even stops benefit- that can be realized when presented with good solid data.
ducdorleans says:
May 25, 2014 at 2:43 am
Statistics is different from a (rock) solid theory? Who knew?
But on the off chance you are serious, since “a solid theory” and “statistics” are entirely different universes, yes, I’d agree they are quite different.
What either of those have to do with periodograms and the Quest for the 11-Year Signal is a mystery to me, though …
Duke, I’m just looking for a signal. I have no theory, since I have no signal. And I have no statistics, since I have no signal. I’m just looking, whether or not I’m proficient in R …
w.
Willis,
I would strongly recommend this paper by Nir Shaviv.
http://www.sciencebits.com/files/articles/CalorimeterFinal.pdf
As many others have said, the analysis presented here suffers from the fatal flaw of **assuming** the solar cycle is 11 years long, and then when not finding a link to climate indicators climate indicators **claiming** that there is no detectable correlation to the **solar cycle**. Since the actual solar cycle length is not fixed the conclusions do not logically follow from the analysis.
To effectively test the hypothesis presented here, one would need to test the relationship between the actual observed climate cycle length and any changes in those climate indicators. It bears making explicit but for a solar cycle that is 9 or 15 years long, there is no reason for the solar effect on climate in year eleven of that cycle to resemble *at all* year eleven in an eleven year cycle.
Cheers, 🙂
Mr. Eschenbach, you have the patience of a saint. Thanks for your consistently clear thinking.
Willis
Have a look at the following correlation between secular global mean temperature and sun spot count:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/mean:756/normalise/plot/sidc-ssn/mean:756/normalise/from:1880
What do you think?
E.M.Smith (May 25, 2014 at 8:28 pm) makes some very interesting observation concerning the “11 year” sunspot cycles being mainly ~10 years and ~12 years with little in the middle at ~11 years. Willis finds the data to be broadened but still largest at ~11 years. Smith correctly points out the often-seen evils of averaging, as an associated complication here.
As a signal processing engineer I look at everything as a filter! We use an analysis filter to examine the sunspot cycle. Distinguishing 10 years or 12 years from 11 years (about 10%) is already “moderate Q”. We can do a LOT better with electronic instruments on the lab bench, but for chaotic nature, it is not surprising that there is a blur. So the ~11 year sunspot cycle looks like an acceptable candidate for a quasi-periodic driving signal.
If we then say that this established potential “solar drive” in turn manifests itself in a manner that translates to effecting climate on Earth, we are looking at the Earth as a filter (a system at least) and postulating the drive as the input to that filter, and various climate parameters as multiple outputs (also the filter has multiple inputs). A Solar/Earth physicist may well calculate possible mechanisms and climatic responses to the driving signal. Willis claims no response is found.
What does a signal processing engineer make of a filter that is not responding. Well, it could be that someone forgot to connect the “input cable” (no mechanism). Or perhaps the experimenter forgot to turn up the gain of the signal generator (weak drive). Or of course the filter may responds to many frequency bands but have a relative notch (or be low-pass) at the frequency set by the drive. Finally, the detection instrument may be improperly set up. All of these things happen in the lab.
Smith then says “To then not find a fictional 11 year cycle in other data is not much of a surprise when the real mode is a wandering range of period lengths with nodes at about 10 and 12 but tending to avoid the 11 year average.”
I disagree. In the bench filter we check this by using the SAME instrument (like a scope) on the input and output. Willis does this – he doesn’t look for just 11 at the output. The engineer here suspects that the signal is weak, or the filter doesn’t like that (high) frequency very much.
Suspicious0bservers says:
May 25, 2014 at 3:58 am
Suspicious, it’s clever of you to claim, without the slightest attempt to support the claim, that “11 years is not long enough”.
Why not? And not long enough to do what? As someone pointed out upthread, when the eclipse occurred, the temperature dropped immediately and precipitously. Since temperature can change that fast, why is 11 years “not long enough” for a small temperature change? That makes no sense.
All I can deduce from your rant is that you, like the other folks here, can’t find the 11-year cycles either. And like them, you have your excuse ready. You don’t provide a scrap of support for the excuse, but you pull it out anyhow.
w.
Matthew R Marler says:
May 25, 2014 at 7:07 pm
quoting RichardCourtney…
“The reason for the global seasonal temperature change is the different coverage of Northern hemisphere (NH) and Southern hemisphere (SH) by water (land is not as good a heat sink as water) so the seasonal variation is greater in the NH than the SH. This support’s Monckton’s claim of a great oceanic heat sink effect.”
Isn’t it *both* the differential sea surface area and the change in total insolation from perihelion to aphelion?
————————————————————————
Yes Mathew, but the affect on the atmosphere is the opposite of what one would expect. (More solar insolation in the SH summer = less atmospheric GAT)
Willis is looking for an small signal in a short (11 year) cycle against a background of many other climate factors, some instance, some which take centuries to manifest, some cyclical, some not, but in combination inherently chaotic. (A daunting task for any one climate factor, and I have yet to see any one factor that has a constant signal)
In theory a change in solar insolation from a weak cycle to a strong cycle should produce a steady graph if it had an effect on GAT. What happens annually should be a clue to Willis that the earths insolation to disparate ocean depth system does not work that way.
In the SH summer the earth receives almost 7% more insolation, (a huge increase dwarfing any CO2 affect) yet the GAT drops, it does not rise. A reasonable question to ask is does the earth, (land, ocean and atmosphere) gain or lose energy during the SH summer? More SH and total solar insolation,= less atmospheric GAT. For how long would this last if it did not change? Would the ocean continue to warm until they warmed the atmosphere? (Does this heat hide in the first 700′?) How long would that take? What is the ocean residence time of the major aspects of solar wavelength that change the most during solar cycles? Does the Sun have cycles within cycles, repetitive Maunder Minimums, and periods of repetitive strong cycles?
Regarding Alec Rawls says:
May 25, 2014 at 7:52 pm
=======================================
Thank you Alec. I think you once made the analogy of a large pot of water on a steady low burn. Turn the heat up from a long duration low to max for two minutes, then turn it back to medium high. It should shock no one that the water continues to heat after the flame is turned down to medium high. The ocean is a large pot indeed.
Only two things affect the energy content of a system in a radiative balance. Either a change in input, or a change in the residence time of energy within the system. (For this system we are talking about the land, the oceans and the atmosphere.)
Konrad says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:19 am
Konrad, I fear in among the 394 comments so far, I didn’t see it. So your nasty tone is unwarranted.
I don’t know why I should respond to such an unpleasant person, but let me see if I can find the comment and discover what th “effective emissivity” is that you are babbling about … hang on …
Well, now, isn’t that just peachy? In fact, this is the first mention of “effective emissivity” in the whole thread, and you’re busting me for not answering it earlier?
Run the “empirical experiment” to do what, exactly?
As I understand the question, Konrad, the situation is a sphere (the planet) inside a shell (the atmosphere), with radiation passing in both directions between the two. Since the reflectivity of both is quite low, the effective emissivity is very close to the theoretical blackbody cavity emissivity. As a result, there is only one emissivity value used in climate calculations. For water, it’s on the order of 0.96 or so. In fact, for most natural substances, it’s well about 0.90. As a result, it is usually assumed to be 1 for all but the most detailed calculations.
Or as Geiger put it in “The Climate Near The Ground”, my climate bible (first published in the 1950’s when people still measured things instead of using models, and now in the seventh edition):
Hope that helps …
Geiger and every other serious scientist I know of thinks that the oceans are a near blackbody for thermal infrared. Actual measurements show the oceans are a near blackbody for thermal infrared (Geiger quotes the measurements made by U. L. Gayevsky). So I fear that your claims will require more than your assertions to establish them …
w.
PS—Do you really think the insults help your scientific case?
rbs says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:52 am
Thanks, rbs. Unfortunately, they haven’t used sunspots. Instead they’ve used variations in 10Be. I’ve discussed the problems with 10Be before. In addition, their data is not available anywhere online that I can find, so I can’t analyze their results. However … they seem too good to be true, 100% correlation.
w.
From Girma on May 25, 2014 at 9:58 pm
I think you’ve adequately shown how too much smoothing ruins the data. A 63 year running mean, when you’re only using 133 years of SSN data?
First, I’m going to specify from:1850 and to:2014 to take full advantage of the HADCRUT4 data. And since it’s available, I’m going to also add in the Tropics (30°N-30°S) subset, as any solar effect should be most noticeable where sunlight has the greatest effect.
BAM, there it is! Will you LOOK at that Practically PERFECT match between tropics and sunspots!
Which indicates the problem. And as a side note, see how the ends are 31.5 years (half of 63) shorter than the range, indicating a true running mean, if there’s not enough data then there is no result.
Now I’ll repeat the same graph but with a more reasonable 5yr+1mo (61 mo) running mean. The month is there so there are whole months on each side of the particular month the mean is being generated for. Actually, I’ll put it on the same graph as what I graphed before, with an offset for clarity.
Whoops, there it is! Your beautiful curve-matching is shot. In broad strokes, you can see SSN following temperatures, until the late 1970’s (the Great Pacific Climate Shift?) where SSN goes down while Temperatures go up. And temperatures had a downward slope starting about 1940, while your over-smoothed curves arc up, up, up.
Smoothing spoils data. Use only enough for clarity, and avoid calculating from smoothed data. Minimal smoothing for presentation, crunch from as raw as you can.
Ah, the “very large (open) pot of pure water on an (conventional AC electric) stove with a conventional regulator (at atmospheric pressure and temperature in a closed room under standard conditions…..) These thermodynamic analogies get soooooooooooo cumbersome so fast …. 8<)
Aside: But, if I am looking for a 11 year cycle (but am I not wrong in assuming that 11 year cycle if the actual sunspot cycles are not ever actually at 11 but at 10.2 OR 11.8 as found above!), what would be the "symptom" of changing the amount of heat energy input with respect to measured temperature? Can you really assume that you know all of the physics involved closely enough to know what you are measuring?
If the water were not yet boiling, then "maybe" changing heat input would change the temperature. Depending n when I measured temperature, and whether the water was frozen or not when I turned on the stove. If I varied the electric current (as pointed out above) so fast that the "average" AC current at 60 Hz (or 50 in Europe) was no longer at 60 Hz, would it matter?
Consider if I was ramping that average AC current (while holding it constantly at 60 HZ) in an 11 minute up-and-down cycle, would I see any difference in temperature in a 5 gallon pot? No. Not if I were measuring either too slow or too fast with respect to the change in heat input.
And, I would see absolutely no change at in water temperature at all if the water were boiling: The temperature would stay at 100.0 C regardless of what I changed the current to nor how frequently I changed the current. (As long as current-in energy exceeded total heat losses. If heat losses exceeded heat input over time, the pot would cool, EVEN IF I INCREASED CURRENT!
Now, the rate of water removal during boiling would vary as i changed average current but that rate of water removal could not be measured by any thermometer! It would be slowed by lag times in all of the points, some quick, some slow as well. Further, if the water were boiling, and I DID want to see any effect from a change in oven current, I would need to measure water level at a rate fast enough to "catch" useful data. If that were done, I would need to remember that a faster boiling would create more bubbles, which (temporarily!) raises water level. Then, later on as water boils away, the faster boiling rate removes the water from the open pot. But what am I measuring when the actual pot water level goes down? The loss of bubbles from today's cooler energy input, or the loss of water from yesterday's faster boiling?
So, would I ever actually "measure" that relationship between varying the stove current and the final effect on water level and temperature?
Hoser says:
May 24, 2014 at 11:49 pm
Wow. 157 so far took the bait.
[??? .mod]
Sorry. I just found nothing really redeeming in more Willis foundering. I like Willis, I really do. Not kidding in any way. But there comes a point where it’s just watching grass grow. Now the grass can be interesting. It can be several shades of green, even some green we never really noticed before. But it’s grass. And it’s still growing.
I understand that you can not see the signal 11 years, but I understand that in this cycle we have a signal 100 years. Now you may find that the signal 11 years will be greater. I would be careful, because the current observations may be surprising, unless someone lived 100 years ago.
Since 2001, he began to as if the new epoch. I think so. I do not know how long it will take. Does you know?
Ulric Lyons says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:02 am
What comment am I supposedly ignoring? Folks, if I don’t answer your comment, just link to the dang comment and ask again, and remember the link. No need to cast asparagus on my morals or to claim I’m “ignoring” you. There is no way I can answer everyone. The day’s not long enough. Four hundred comments on this post alone.
As a result, I constantly practice comment triage—no answer, short answer, long answer. There are lots of reasons I don’t answer a given comment. Sometimes I don’t understand the claims. Sometimes there’s no “there” there. Sometimes I’m tired. Sometimes the person is just too insulting. Sometimes, I can’t be bothered to explain something to someone for the third time. So sue me …
In any case, what does your graphic supposedly show? Here’s the periodogram of the solar wind:
Largest peak at 10.5 years, clear sunspot connection. A cross-correlation analysis shows a lag of about two years between monthly sunspots and monthly solar wind, with a maximum correlation of about 0.35. Clear sunspot connection.
Regards,
w.
Matthew R Marler:
Thankyou for your question to me at May 25, 2014 at 10:21 pm.
I agree the answer provided by David A at May 25, 2014 at 7:07 pm and, therefore, I refer you to that.
Richard
PS I apologise for this response being terse but – as you can see from my above interactions with the Mods – my longer posts to this thread tend to be vanished by the WordPress system.
You are looking for an 11ish year correlation based on sunspots? How do you separate the sunspots that had no position to effect Earth. Of those that could, what was their size and scope. Of those how many expelled energy in a manner that might effect Earth. And of those that did effect Earth, what part of Earth did they effect and in which season (tilt and distance)? Further sunspots are not the only Earth effective sun phenomenon. You might get close looking at aurora records, its an energy transfer record, more earth directed activity, more aurora, less Earth directed activity, less aurora, no hot plate required:). Why not the solar polar field strength? Why not any number of things besides plaque on the sun?
The test is on though, lower solar activity (sunspots) according to popular theory backed by historical observation says our climate should get colder. We do not know however if this will effect both hemispheres. Do I think we will cool to an ice age? NO, I think ice age would be the result of a perfect storm scenario… happens but not often:)
thingadonta says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:20 am
It’s not like that at all. The hemispheric surface temperatures change up to 13° in a mere six months. And as someone pointed out above, in an eclipse the temperature plunges immediately. Where is your “lag effect”?
When the surface temperatures can change that rapidly, the “thermal inertia” explanation won’t hold water.
Regards,
w.
Here’s the deal. Earth is a water planet orbiting a variable star. Its climatic fluctuations are largely under the control of variations in the electromagnetic radiation & magnetic flux of that star & the modulations in delivery of those effects to the atmosphere & surface of that planet regulated by cosmic ray ups & downs & the orbital mechanics of the planet.
IMO the fact of these observations has been well established on various time scales from billions of years to decades. Changes in the outputs of the sun & in how its EM & magnetic effects, like the solar wind, are received on earth are IMO conclusively demonstrably felt here constitute the major forcing of climate here & on other bodies in the solar system.
Were it not for the CACA mafia, this fact would be intuitively obvious, IMO. The one observable fact upon which all with an open mind should be able to agree is that the atmospheric concentration of the trace gas CO2 at least for the past 600 million years does not correlate with major climatic changes.
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:31 am
Interesting, Greg, I hadn’t thought of that. Theoretically, you can use any resolution that you like. However, I think the gain is illusory. I don’t think you can tell anything at a resolution that is finer than the underlying time step of the data, whether that is monthly, daily, quarterly, or yearly.
To do it, however, you just sample more frequently. I use an “sapply” function to feed a list of numbers to a single function called “sinefit”. Sinefit returns a list of two things, the original data and a variable called “full”, which is the best-fit sine wave of the specified cycle length. The sapply function looks like this:
This says, apply a sequence of numbers from runstart to runend to a function of x, with said function of x being
The “range” function returns (min, max). The “diff” function returns the difference of the two, the peak-to-peak range of the best-fit sine.
To sample it more frequently, you’d need to change the statement
to something like
Of course, there may be knock-on effects …
Like I said, though, I think the gains are illusory. However, I could be wrong, play with it some and see what you think.
w.
at RACookPE1978 says:
May 25, 2014 at 11:28 pm
===================================
Jim Hansen is expecting our oceans to test your boiling pot analogy any year now.
Discussion reminds me of the pendulum swing (see video link below). There are times when things line up how the sun’s energy output has a positive correlation on various climatic events on Earth. Other times it takes 2, 3, or 4 occurrences to trigger a climatic event on Earth where they need to work in tandem (see the swing) to create this global warming or cooling. Sometimes it requires the sun’s help, others not so (think asteroid hit or volcanic explosion). It would seem paradoxical that the northern latitude ought to be hotter during winter when Earth is at its closet to the sun but with the Earth’s tilt half-way on the other side of the orbital path around the sun makes all the difference from what could easily be a scorching winter or a cold winter.
Willis, one expanded question for you. As energy cannot be destroyed, how long do you think the solar energy entering the tropical oceans to a depth of 50′ stays in the ocean before reaching the surface? How about 100′, 200′ 300′ up to its maximum of 800′?
Does additional solar insolation continue to enter the ocean and atmosphere while that older energy stays within the oceans?
What is the average residence time of solar insolation in the oceans during a strong solar cycle?
Does the average residence time of solar insolation change during a weak solar cycle as the solar spectrum changes, and therefore the average ocean depth penetration also changes?
You see it is really one question expanded on the same concept, so I am not really cheating.
Re MAC says:
May 26, 2014 at 12:56 am
==============================================================
Mac, the last paragraph in my post here says much the same thing…
David A says:
May 24, 2014 at 10:33 pm
In affect, major climate shifts happen when disparate forcing’s and feedbacks form a positive or negative harmonic.
Camp and Tung, as well as Lean and Rind find signatures of the solar cycle in the climate data, although that found by Lean is about half the amplitude as that by Camp and Tung.
http://www.amath.washington.edu/research/articles/Tung/journals/solar-jgr.pdf
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2008GL034864/abstract
Stephen Wilde says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:00 am
Emergent phenomena are the negative system response to any forcing and they do indeed keep the system stable.
I would agree 100%, this comes under the heading of “dissipative structures” within Ilya Prigogine’s nonlinear thermodynamics:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissipative_system
In fact all climate / weather structures, whether ocean currents, gyres, ENSO, Hadley cells, depressions, cyclones, all these are Prigogine’s dissipative structures. Thus indeed, nonlinear dynamics are the only game in town regarding climate and looking elsewhere for an explanatory system for climate is to 100% waste one’s time.
Thus observing a change in the pattern of emergent phenomena is all one would expect to see in response to a forcing element.
Non sequitur from your opening correct statement. Ed Lorenz foundational paper “Deterministic nonperiodic flow”
http://www.astro.puc.cl/~rparra/tools/PAPERS/lorenz1962.pdf
– again without reference to which climate science is equally meaningless as cosmology while stubbornly ignoring Einstein’s relativity papers, –
shows that a nonlinear-chaotic system can change level by itself without external forcing. Nonlinear oscillators can be forced or non-forced. A change in system structure or regime can either be forced or not, so is not automatically diagnostic of a change – or even existence – of a forcing regime.
But your other implication of negative system response and thus negative feedback is correct – I would say. I noted this important contribution from George E Smith below:
george e. smith says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:42 pm
“”””””……joeldshore says:
May 24, 2014 at 7:06 pm
george e. smith says:
BUT ! back to a recent (not so long ago) Willis essay, on some observations of a Volcanic dimming incident(s) I believe made in Hawaii (shoot me if I’m wrong Willis) where for some months, there was a measured, very significant reduction (20-25% sticks in my mind) in the SURFACE solar irradiance; that decayed exponentially over a few months to a year or so (in that region) BUT, the local temperature anomalies showed no observable temperature change at all (in that region.
It was a striking demonstration that the weather / climate feedback loop, can squelch a host of solar irradiance variation, that happens over time intervals, that are clearly much longer than the thermal time constants.
Well the day night temperature cycle proves that the thermal response can be pretty darn fast, compared to a three month SI deprivation.
So that essay of yours Willis proved to me quite solidly, that there is a very active negative feedback, temperature regulating loop in play.
In the final analysis there HAS to be strong negative feedback and self-stability of the climate system. In addition to all the other evidence for this is the dim sun paradox. Climate remaining in a similar temperature regime over the phanerozioc despite 5-8% change in the sun’s heating output. The most likely (certainly the most parsimonious) explanation for this is Gaia type self regulation of the climate with the participation of the biosphere. This powerful self-regulation has to be considered in any discussion of climate “forcing”. Thus I consider the term climate “forcing” to be very problematic and unhelpful, suggesting the egregious fiction of a passive climate system.
Thus generally speaking I take Willis’ side against the “peleton” of cyclists in regard to solar or any other “forcings”.
Gary Palmgren says:
May 25, 2014 at 5:36 am
Mmm … sounds interesting, but exactly how do you propose to “use the data”? Cross-correlation? I’m happy to show that. I enjoy the periodograms because they reveal things like the tides in the atmospheric pressure data, but like I said in the head post, use what you want.
An interesting proposal. You ask, “Can your analysis find the original magnitude and lag?”. I’ve never tested that. Before testing it, I would say that no, it will not find the lag, it’s not designed to do that. Nor will it find the “original magnitude”.
However, what it will do regardless of magnitude and lag is to identify the power in the appropriate cycle lengths. So, let me go do it … well it took an hour, but here you go. First, the proxy data. I created the proxy data by first lagging the sunspots with a standard exponential lag, with a scale factor lambda of 0.2 and a time constant tau of four years. Note that this is not just a four-year delay of the signal, it is a true lagging of the input data.
To that I added uniform (non-gaussian) noise at the ratio of eight parts noise to one part signal. Here is the resulting proxy data:
And here is the periodogram of the proxy data …
Despite what is a huge transformation of the data, with a four-year exponential lag smearing the results, and despite having eight times as much non-gaussian noise as there is lagged signal, the periodogram clearly reveals the relationship with the sunspots …
Interesting thought, Gary, thanks for the suggestion.
w.
TimTheToolMan says:
May 25, 2014 at 6:47 am
Jeez, Tim, could you please be a little more unpleasant? Particularly when it appears you haven’t grasped what I’m doing. So I’ll explain it again.
Along with the sunspots, UV runs on an ~11 year cycle, in sync with all the rest of the solar changes. If it’s a long sunspot cycle it’s a long UV cycle. Yes, the details of the rise and fall are different, but it is still an ~11-year cycle.
As a result, regardless of the cycle-to-cycle fluctuations you mention, if the UV were having a significant effect on climate, it would be seen as an ~11-year cycle in some climate dataset.
Which is why I’m looking for an 11-year cycle. Because that way I don’t have to consider either the exact shape or the nature of the cycle, whether it’s solar wind or magnetism or UV.
Hope that helps,
w.
Sparks says:
May 25, 2014 at 7:55 am
Without having the data, my comments are:
1) LINKS! LINKS TO THE EXACT DATA! Your graph is useless without that.
2) What is the correlation between the raw datasets?
3) What does the cross-correlation look like for all months lag?
4) Why just November and March?
5) The centered moving average is a horrible thing. It munges the data mightily. And when you are looking at sunspot data, the 11-year centered moving average is the absolute worst choice possible. See “Sunny Spots Along The Parana River” for a full discussion of these issues.
Thanks, getting closer …
w.
James Hall says:
May 25, 2014 at 8:51 am
James, all the data sources are listed and linked to at the end of the head post.
w.
Willis: “something like
seq(runstart, runend, by=.1)
Of course, there may be knock-on effects …
Like I said, though, I think the gains are illusory. However, I could be wrong, ”
Thanks Willis , I’d got that far, as I think I indicated. It’s the knock on effects (getting it to scale and plot properly) that were the problem. And since I don’t have the familiarity with I can’t spend the time learning just fix trivial stuff like that.
I wrote out the sunP data to text and used gnuplot, a tool I master fairly well. It’s a few more pasted commands but no real prob. for me however, it would be good to have this build into SFT.
You can see on Tahiti/SSN triplet plot, I had smooth curves not clunky join-the-dots resolution.
Yes, it is beneficial. Look around 5y mark as it stands it’s pretty unusable resolution. It would be nice to have something a bit better than 1/12 intervals around the 11 year mark too, for a bit more precision in this case.
There is not a direct linear link between TS resolution and the step intervals. For example with 200y of data you should be able to determine a 5.5 y period pretty damn accurately. More so as you get shorter, not less so. On the contrary the long periods are very inaccurate anyway but get more and more resolution which slows the whole thing down for no benefit.
One month TS resolution does not imply 1mo resolution of period. It’s reciprocal really.
To Pamela Gray:
A belated thank you for providing a link to a paper relating trends, up to 2000, in kHz ionosphere transmission to models of interaction from an atmospheric greenhouse effect . ( The authors subtracted solar periodicity).
The earlier quoted literature in the paper will hopefully fill in some much needed tutorial reading on the background to this influence.
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 9:33 am
I warned you there would likely be knock-on effects, but that’s just a fact of life, not a fault of R.
In any case, I’m still not convinced that the procedure will give any real increase in information. Here’s the difference, for example, between monthly and annual data:
I think that if I increase the resolution on the sunspot periodogram while still using the annual data, it won’t look anything like the real monthly data … I’ll report back on that one.
w.
@Willis Eschenbach:
“Mike, your tone is unpleasant…”
Writing a formal criticism is “unpleasant”? Just a question: Are you really grown up?
“…your logic is absent…”
These are basics of climate science which you are about to deny. 🙂
“…you provide no facts…”
“My friend, I don’t trust anyone, including myself.”
Here is your answer for providing no facts. Why should I prove anything when you don’t trust anybody and don’t even get along with the basics?
“…your citations are non-existent.”
Which citations?
P.S.: OK, I admit trusting nobody in climate science too (I think you know why). And, to make it clear, your mistake in your research might be comparing temperatures DIRECTLY with solar activity, ignoring the lag between change in solar activity and climate (which can be 10 to 15 years long) and ignoring all other possible climate influences, even anthropogenic ones (and – very important – their feedbacks). Even if sun controls climate, you won’t get a high correlation just by comparing it with the global temperature data (alone with the lag, it’s like comparing sine with cosine). You have to correct all noise and all other influences first.
Sorry for being that rude sometimes. But I also want to thank you. Because of people like you, I isolate myself from possible conspiracy theories and keep getting the facts on my own, which is necessary for working science.
P.P.S.: You deleted my comment while quoting it 1:1 in your comment you little genius. 😉
But it’s still good that I backed up most of my comments here.
I’m no climate or solar expert and I’ve not had time to fully digest Willis’s analysis or all the comments. But I can’t help feeling in some ways we are oversimplifying it in other ways making it too complex, and looking at it the wrong way. Imagine we lived in a time before we had the basic laws of thermodynamics necessary to forecast weather. So the attempts to look for a solar link are a bit like trying to understand weather from observations like ‘red sky at night, shepherds delight’. Similarly I wonder if the solar influence is just as complex as weather forecasting if you don’t know what’s actually going on – a complex system with lots of inputs and interactions, but relatively simple once you’ve figured out the thermodynamics, it’s just a matter of improving forecast accuracy by increasing your measurements and computing power.
Like many of the difficult engineering failure investigations I’ve worked on that at the time seem inexplicable, the answer may be surprisingly simple: The data doesn’t make sense, the clever guy comes up with a theory that get’s more and more complex, people fall for it (just as I fear people are falling for the CO2 AGW theory) because the clever guy seems to be able to explain away all the contradictory evidence by making the theory more and more complex, no one can argue with him so most people believe him. But suddenly one day we find the real answer and laugh because it’s surprising how simple it is “it’s just the laws of physics”. I think the most likely way to understand the solar link (if it exists at all) may be by finding the right way of looking at the data rather than finding the mechanism, with the right way of looking at the data suddenly the mechanism(s) may suddenly appear very obvious and simple ‘just the laws of physics’ that we’re already very familiar with. BUT, by finding the right way of looking at the data I do not mean what I fear might often be happening which is making the mistake of playing around with the data and theoretical model until you find a way of making it fit your theory, it should just naturally fall into place with no assistance at all just by laying out the data. That’s often how you know you’ve got the right answer, if it’s hard work and complicated to make it fit (like the CO2 AGW theory seems to be to me) that’s probably a sign you’ve got it wrong.
Perhaps the first mistake is to think we should be looking at sunspots. I presume they are only an approximation of solar outputs of which there may be several and each doing different things. I’m assuming we have outputs such as radiation of which the spectrum is constantly changing; uv may have a different affect to ir, etc. Magnetic field, which presumably is actually changing on a 22 year cycle, i.e. 11 years of one polarity might be having a different affect on some aspects of weather/climate/the thermodynamics to a similar but opposite 11 year cycle with the opposite polarity. Presumably we have solar wind, charged particles, flares/solar storms as well. Maybe some times a much higher proportion of the flares miss us, other times a higher proportion hit us because of our orbit and/or how they come out of the Sun. Maybe there are other factors from outside our solar system which can be variable of their own accord or be modulated by solar activity. Each of these may affect different aspects of the thermodynamic system (weather/climate/energy transfer/release/storage) and perhaps there are interactions between many of these factors. Then all of this may depend on what’s happening with our planet, if the north hemisphere or southern hemisphere are facing the Sun at the time, or if it happens during night or day. Then there’s what our weather systems etc are doing at the time too, just as the affect of a racket hitting a ball will depend what that ball is already doing when you hit it. If we’re looking at cycles, say 11 years, then it only needs a few years, where some other factor disrupted the results one way in one cycle and the opposite way during another cycle to confuse our analysis, so I think we may need to think more in terms of ‘weather’ rather than ‘climate’.
Perhaps one affect is on the jetstreams, but again it may not fall into the usual measures of performance we are using, e.g. a fluid flow may take route a or b or anywhere inbetween depending on some forcing factor, but if the flow is weak perhaps the forcing factor has less control on the direction and it is mostly stuck somewhere near the middle between a and b constantly changing and never getting to a or b, but if the flow is strong it tends to flip very quickly between a or b, never inbetween except briefly as it flips and then stays in one of those extremes for longer.
I’m wondering if another big mistake is to be thinking in terms of just one output such as temperature, precipitation, humidity, pressure, etc. A mistake to be thinking global average, to be thinking smoothed signals, to be thinking of fixed locations. A mistake to be thinking cycles. Instead we should be considering the whole thermodynamic system, all the changes of energy, including potential energy and kinematic energy, how chaotic or disorganised the system is becoming, how is the weather changing. Some things might influence the energy balance, some might influence temperature, some kinematic energy, some potential energy, some heat content, etc, etc. Perhaps one thing to look at would be how the ‘dead reckoning’ longrange weather forecasts go wrong and can we correlate that with anything outside our planet. I am just guessing, but maybe a largish proportion of that’s usually blamed on jetstream behaviour? If so maybe we then also need to look at what’s driving jetstream(s) between, say state ‘a and b’ and what’s affecting how well that’s controlled, i.e. is something (else) making the flow stronger and that’s what makes the controlling factor more effective. A different factor controlling strength to the one driving it between state a and b.
I wonder if it’s a big mistake to think in terms of, say something directly influencing global average temperature. Perhaps we should think of something changing weather patterns, which might mean changing hot and cold spots (and probably not in one location on the surface, i.e. it is a ‘hotspot’ in the ‘weather’, not a location on the surface), after many years we might see that, because of the way we measure average global temperature it appears as a trend, but it is such an indirect connection it would be very misleading to be analysing it that way. Of course the energy balance has to apply but I wonder if it is such a complex system with so many freedoms to do its own thing we should not just focus on energy balance, and must also consider that energy balance is not just temperature, heat content, but also potential and kinetic energy and disorder. Maybe we have long cycles in jetstream behaviour, the different behaviour may cause different weather patterns, but not show up on our smoothed and average measures of temperature, rainfall etc, but might be more conducive to glacier advance and after several decades we notice a slight drop in global temperature, because the thermodynamic system has allowed more snow and ice, not necessarily because of a change in energy in/out of our planet or ‘weather system’.
That may sound very complex and almost impossible for a partime enthusiast with limited resources, but I don’t think it necessarily needs to be nearly as complicated as I made it sound. I think we just need a different approach to the one Willis and most others are taking to find, prove or disprove a solar link.
It’s obvious there are some other parts of the code need changing if the data interval is different because for R it’s just a series of numbers. That much is expected but I can’t be bother to learn R just to fix it. I’m sure you will know what the tweak. The 1/8 is odd.
Note your annual points all seem to lie exactly on the monthly curve.
A lot of that detail is windowing artefacts anyway. The ‘triplets’ around 7.5,8.5, 14 and 18 are probably just reflections of the main three peaks.
I think there is some real energy around 9 and 13 but it should probably not be splitting like that. In fact, I think the whole 16-18 band is artefacts too. I have concluded that from other work, not from this spectrum.
That does not mean that extra precision in locating the main peaks would not be valuable. That is desirable.
Paul UK: “I think the most likely way to understand the solar link (if it exists at all) may be by finding the right way of looking at the data rather than finding the mechanism, with the right way of looking at the data suddenly the mechanism(s) may suddenly appear very obvious and simple ‘just the laws of physics’ that we’re already very familiar with.”
You are correct. The first step is to define what the solar signal is before trying to decide whether it is present or not. This was one of Willis’ initial points. I don’t think we have got that far yet. Which is why I’m putting so much effort into analysing the spectral information.
One thing seems pretty clear, it’s not just a simple 11y cycle and those expecting that is what a solar influence on climate should look like will certainly not find it. Many will then, erroneously conclude there is no correlation with solar.
If you don’t have an clear idea what you’re looking for your sure ain’t going to find it , even if it’s there in front of you.
I’m working on finding “the right way of looking at the data”. 😉
Mike Jonas says:
May 25, 2014 at 7:52 pm
======================================================
Well, maybe there are flaws, maybe there aren’t. Filtering out the vitriol, and a few (what appear to be) misdirected responses based on some kind of misunderstanding of the article, I actually see a very useful process unfolding here — something akin to how I would imagine the scientific world working.
I don’t expect people to self-censor errors in understanding, but it’s not helpful, and does not do this site any good, for readers to have to waste time (and endure a vaguely icky feeling) looking at vulgar, ad-hominem nonsense.
It would seem to me that people who are intelligent enough to respond to the thrust of Mr. Eschenbach’s post should have matured to the point where they can ask themselves if their post is worthy of the obvious effort that Mr. Eschenbach (or any other writer) has invested in bringing us an interesting article, whether one may or may not agree with the argument contained therein, and self-censor accordingly.
There is something to be admired about maturity and self-control. There is nothing to be admired about the lack of either.
Willis writes “Particularly when it appears you haven’t grasped what I’m doing. So I’ll explain it again.”
I can see what you’re doing Willis but let me elaborate. Suppose in cycles 1 and 2 the average amount of UV is lower and then in cycles 3, 4 and 5, its higher. Across all those cycles TSI might have been very similar but you can see that the atmosphere will react differently over the first 22 years than the second 33 years. And you’ll find no obvious 11 year cycle there by looking at TSI.
I’m not saying this is what happened, but I am stressing the point that we simply dont have enough SIM data to be able to understand what’s really happening. Instead we assume TSI is representative of “energy” directed at the earth and gloss over the detail.
Scepticism isn’t about giving an alternative argument, its about spotting flaws in the existing argument and IMO this is a big one with understanding the sun’s role in our climate.
In addition to the comments above about the Hale cycle.
No evidence of an 11 year cycle in temperature data? Well Piers Corbyn agrees with you Willis.
[ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6R26PXRrgds&feature=player_detailpage#t=520 ]
The problem is that an analysis of the 11 year periodicity of sunspot data ignores the 22 year Hale cycle. This is because the 11 year cycle of sunspot data are always recorded as positive number counts. This positive number signal fails to capture the fact that alternate sunspots cycles have opposite leading sunspot pair magnetic polarity, the 22 year Hale cycle.
The process of recording all 11 year sunspot cycles as positive number counts removes from the historic record of sunspot data the presence of this alternating positive / negative 22 year magnetic signal. To restore the 22 year Hale cycle to sunspot data it is necessary to count half of the sunspot cycles as positive numbers and alternate these positive counts with negative value sunspot counts for all of the following 11 year cycle. This process of sequential positive value and negative value sunspot cycles restores the magnetic signal to the sunspot data and allows the 22 year frequency Hale cycle, which Piers Corbyn claims can be correlated with world temperature data, to be observed.
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 25, 2014 at 10:46 pm
————————————
“Geiger and every other serious scientist I know of thinks that the oceans are a near blackbody for thermal infrared. Actual measurements show the oceans are a near blackbody for thermal infrared (Geiger quotes the measurements made by U. L. Gayevsky).”
And in that lies the critical flaw in the very foundation of the whole radiative GHE hypothesis. It is also the error that prevents an understanding of how a minor variation in UV/SW between solar cycles can cause very minor 0.8C temperature change over 150 years.
And the critical flaw? The oceans are nowhere even close to a “near blackbody”. Firstly the absorption of UV/SW below the diurnal overturning layer allows energy accumulation outside of normal seasonal cycles. If you were hoping to see anything regarding an 11 year cycle that is clearly beyond the resolution of any data available. You would be trying to detect 0.059C change for an 11 year period. This would be lost in noise.
“So I fear that your claims will require more than your assertions to establish them …”
You should know by now that I always do the empirical experiments. Any one can repeat them for themselves. The experiment to check the difference between apparent emissivity of water (~0.95, the setting used to get a reasonable IR measurement of water in surface normal conditions) compared to effective emissivity (the number that should be used for calculating the true ability of water to radiatively cool) is simple.
– Take a warm water sample and prevent evaporative cooling with thin IR transparent film floated onto the surface.
– Using an IR thermometer at emissivity setting of 0.95 measure the surface temperature.
Confirm with surface thermocouple
– Now place the water sample with a cryogenic cooled “sky” and observe the temperature drop in IR reading.
– Adjust emissivity setting down until correct IR temperature reading is regained.
– Repeat the experiment with materials closer to “near blackbody” and compare.
I have found below 0.8 works for water under a -40C “sky”. I could spend more money trying to get a reading under a -270C “sky”, but the is little point. Emissivity of 0.8 is already below the 0.92 UV/SW absorption factor for water. 0.95 is an emissivity setting used to overcome the twin IR thermography problems of cavity effect and Hohlraum effect.
Add to this the fact that water also diverges from “near blackbody” in that it is is a selective surface. For transparent materials, intermittent UV/SW at depth results in a far higher equilibrium temperature than the same radiation absorbed at the surface. Consider that water is a selective surface and you find that our oceans need atmospheric cooling to prevent them becoming a giant evaporation constrained solar pond. And our atmosphere has only one effective cooling mechanism – radiative gases.
If you treat the oceans as a “near blackbody” you cannot see how 10% UV variance between solar cycles can accumulate to cause a very minor 0.8C temperature variation over 150 years.
Sorry about that, the Youtube timestamp did not work.
Trying again.
See Pier’s comments starting at 9:25.
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 26, 2014 at 12:10 am:
“In any case, what does your graphic supposedly show? Here’s the periodogram of the solar wind:”
Well if you think a 10.5yr signal is the only thing that matters within all that noise, that’s up to you,
http://snag.gy/99MpL.jpg
I would take an event based look at the correlation in the short term, like how do the monthly Tahiti pressure values compare, or with daily-monthly Arctic and North Atlantic Oscillation values. If there is a direct connection with the the solar wind and atmospheric teleconnections, it would have to working down to scales that we regard as weather.
“lsvalgaard says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:49 am
“We know of no other ‘cycles’ drifting in an out of phase, but one can, of course, always ascribe things to causes not known, in which case, anything goes. I would not call that science, though.”
In other words, ACO2 driven climate change.”
No answer (If read/seen). No answer may suggest you agree that, “causes not known” that “we” “ascribe” to consesus (Which is NOT science)?
Willis
“When the surface temperatures can change that rapidly, the “thermal inertia” explanation won’t hold water.”
Change in the surface temperature and the bulk of the ocean are two different things. The surface temperature goes up and down. However, the bulk of the ocean, like the sea level rise, always goes up. Climate is determined by the temperature of the bulk of the oceans. So is the CO2 concentration, as it has been going up like the sea level rise and the bulk of the ocean temperature.
The CO2 does not depend on the surface temperature, but on the bulk of the ocean temperature.
Konrad says:
May 26, 2014 at 6:04 am
“Firstly the absorption of UV/SW below the diurnal overturning layer allows energy accumulation outside of normal seasonal cycles.”
A crucial observation. The oceans absorb visible light in a layer 100 meters deep, but emit IR from a layer only 1mm deep. This does not mean that the first law is violated because over time the same heat that is absorbed is re-emitted. It does not mean that radiation theory is invalid. It means that the oceans trap heat, as you say. Heat that is absorbed in the deep layers must convect to the surface to be re-emitted, and this is a slow process. That is why the oceans act as a major lagging influence on temperature change. It also means that wind or anything else that mixes the surface layer will cause an immediate release of heat, which causes more wind, more heat release until the process is exhausted. This is a phenomenon that must be kept in mind when we are theorizing about ENSO or other convective events such as hurricanes.
Willis sez: “In any case, I just checked his first claim, that the Vaal River flows have a 21-year periodicity … sorry. Using his own data, they have an 18-19 year periodicity, what we used to call “close, but no cigar”. ”
This corroborates my earlier statement about the 19 year weather cycle in that region.
The Vaal River drains and flows through the Summer Rainfall region of Southern Africa. The region has a 19 year (some say 18.6) drought cycle. It is presently 2 years past the peak (the rainy end) which means plentiful rain in summer, raining later (well past the 1 April ‘normal’ start of the dry season) and early rains in late August and September.
The point is that this is a well established climate cycle involving rainfall. When it is not raining it is hotter because it is dry – a lot hotter in summer. It is also colder in winter when it rains late and early. This season will be as miserably cold as it was last year.
The origin of the cycle is probably Metonic http://www.mythicalireland.com/astronomy/moonmovements/metoniccycle.html and involves the way the moon pulls the Indian ocean around the Cape of Good Hope.
Now, what are the chances of finding a small 11 year cycle buried in the records when one so large is smothering everything? Zilch.
Are there places on earth where the local effects of, for example the moon, are far smaller, or invisible? Perhaps that is where to look for evidence of a 10-12 year cycle caused by something solar. If it were found, all it would prove is ‘that there is one’. Yippie-dee.
I find Willis’ question answered with a persistent ‘No.” Doesn’t mean there isn’t a connection, but if there is, it is probably something involving stored heat in the oceans that overcomes the thermo-regulating effects of the thunderstorm/cloud system. Perhaps there are 11 year steps in ocean heat content rather than a ‘cycle’. As land temperatures are predominantly modified by the oceans, then any cycle has to involve ocean heat. One thing is clear: the increase in CO2 concentration is having little effect on anything.
For pete’s sake. Look folks. All you who are looking for a tiny solar variable that is then amplified or damped by Earth’s intrinsic systems disprove your speculations right then and there. Your pet solar variable connection will be swamped by the far more powerful intrinsic variables that affect solar “stuff” (IE SWIR and anything else ol’Sol sends into our atmosphere). If you contend the Earth can amplify it, it can also dampen it. Unless you are willing to admit that for all this to work the way you say it works, the Earth is sentient and knows when to set its own oscillations to amplify solar input. If you say it is a random coupled occurrence, then you must admit that a signal cannot be found.
Point, set, and match.
Greg Goodman says:
May 25, 2014 at 6:20 pm
Resume of evidence so far:
1. 10,11,11.8 triplet in SSN ( probable 11,136 modulation )
2. same triplet found in Tahiti SLP, very close match of frequencies.
3. Very strong 10.8 y peak in cross power spectrum
4. Clear onset of circa 10.7 year pattern in SSN-SLP correlation function on positive lag side
5. First peak is negative peak at ~ 30 months lag ( SLP lagging SSN ).
30 months is just short of a quarter cycle. ( pi/2 lag ? )
6. Neg. correlation : incr. SSN => lower SLP; would indicate a negative feedback.
http://climategrog.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/tahiti_ssn_cc.png?w=843
Point, set, and match.
Now go back to your school books and explain that.
Albert Einstein once said, “No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.” Einstein’s words express a foundational principle of science intoned by the logician, Karl Popper: Falsifiability. In order to verify a hypothesis there must be a test by which it can be proved false. A thousand observations may appear to verify a hypothesis, but one critical failure could result in its demise. The history of science is littered with such examples.
Part 1
1.
It appears that no one has asked the very critical question-Where is the credible test/experiment that proves that the Greenhouse gas effect exists? There is another important question that has not been asked is “Where is the credible experiments that show that reducing the CO2 content in the atmosphere will cause a decrease in atmospheric temperature?
Looking at the great quote from Albert Einstein above- If one experiment shows that an important part of the Hypotheses of Greenhouse gas effect cannot be proved or is disproved it is very likely that the Hypotheses is false from beginning to end.
Here is an experiment that shows that at least 5 of the features of the Hypotheses are false and here is a reference to another experiment that shows that another feature is ass backward as presented by the CAGW crowd.
The Greenhouse Effect Explored
Written by Carl Brehmer | 26 May 2012
Is “Water Vapor Feedback” Positive or Negative?
Exploiting the medium of Youtube Carl Brehmer is drawing wider attention to a fascinating experiment he performed to test the climatic impacts of water in our atmosphere.
Carl explains, “An essential element of the “greenhouse effect” hypothesis is the positive “water vapor feedback” hypothesis. That is, if something causes an increase in the temperature this will cause an increase in the evaporation of water into water vapor.”
Another factor that even the meteorologists have not included in there pretend thinking is “evaporative cooling that is occurring on at least 99.95 % of the earth’s surface.
The Experiment that Failed and can save the World trillions.
Proving the “greenhouse gas effect” does not exist!
By Berthold Klein P.E 1-15-2012 Incorporation of comments of Dr.’s Pierre Latour, Dr. Nasif Nahle and others.
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 8:40 am
“Point, set, and match.”
Let’s not be fooled, Pamela. The game’s still on. Solar variation does have its effect and will be felt eventually. It’s just a matter of time.
OK, in layman’s eye’s (that is the lower end of laymen in my case), Willis is saying temps do not go up during early cycle climb to max then down during last half of cycle decline…no up then down change over 11 years…BUT, is there a ‘signal’ where temps fall/climb thru-out the whole cycle ? Like the strong cycles 17,18,&19 (temps climb) then SC20 (temps fall) then stronger cycles 21/22 (temps climb). Does this point to some solar connection…not totally…but some?
Greg, which SSN group do you use? There are several out there. And they differ significantly. Their authors even go on to sometimes disagree with themselves! I would even say our SSN data sets differ more so than our temperature data sets. And if we somehow get a corrected set, what will that do to all the papers demonstrating weak correlations between SSN and SLP? So no, my school books do not back you up. Maybe you should read them too? And by the way, I believe what matters in this discussion isn’t Sea Level Pressure but whether or not solar variations are correlated with global temperature data. So far, I haven’t seen anyone here bring forth a valid and reliable piece of data that demonstrates that correlation. With emphasis on valid and reliable. I can smell an elephant’s trunk wriggling from miles away.
Another point, sea level pressure appears to correlate with SSN (depending of course on which SSN data set you use) regionally, not globally. And that brings up all kinds of red flags for me. Sea Level Pressure is up and down in different locations all over the globe having both short and long term noise and trends. It may indeed be just a random occurrence that regional spots will surreptitiously be in sync with SSN. In any case, peer reviewed papers continue to bemoan the fact that a mechanism escapes them.
Weak, weak, weak evidence not fit for an honest to goodness resume. A padded one yes.
an interesting exercise Willis – it answers my bewilderment over not seeing great overall changes around me – but in in the end i’m skeptical over your skepticism – if each sun cycle produced noticeable changes – wouldn’t the connection between it and the climate have been noted long ago – besides – the talk about the Maunder Minimum for example is talk about a series of sun cycles – and i wouldn’t be surprised to find that the effect of the sun on an already complex system like our climate is cumulative and lagging
anyway – examining a sun cycle was a good idea – if your results pan out – it eliminates a blind spot – in those of us who had that blind spot
Let’s hope that the Little Ice Age event some here are alluding to as being in our near future will not occur. Why? It isn’t the lack of sunspots that will keep us in the dark. It’s the volcanic eruptions during The Little Ice Age event that darkened the skies, killing, both directly and indirectly, indiscriminately, and from near and great distances away from the explosions themselves.
From Berthold Klein on May 26, 2014 at 9:35 am:
That gets proven every day, all around the planet. In dry desert areas that lack atmospheric water vapor, said vapor being the most important greenhouse gas of all, the diurnal temperature swings are enormous. Sun comes up, you roast, Sun goes down, you freeze. Lacking the most important greenhouse gas, there is not enough greenhouse gas effect to retain the daily heat at night.
But in the warm humid tropical areas, with plenty of water vapor, the variation is far much less. Granted this is helped by daytime thunderstorms cooling things off, but there is clearly significant retention of daytime heat throughout the night time.
Why must a single credible test/experiment be cited for something as obvious as a cat dunked in water getting wet? However, in the spirit of free and open scientific inquiry, you may confirm that by dunking as many cats as you want. In water no warmer than room temperature, and not with my cats.
Some are commenting that Willis’ “I hold that this shows that the temperature of the system is relatively insensitive to changes in forcing.” isn’t demonstrated in this post. Maybe not, but here’s a simple example of his statement.
The earth’s eccentricity causes 90 watts/m2 more sun-power to the earth in January than July (for comparison CO2 causes a few watts/m2 extra forcing worldwide so far). Yet there doesn’t seem to be any semi-annual signal in the temp data.
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 8:40 am
” If you contend the Earth can amplify it, it can also dampen it.”
I must admit I find your post here to be quite confusing. I think pretty much everyone agrees that finding a 0.2% amplitude cycle in a noisy, filtered system like climate is pretty difficult if not impossible. Further, even if it were possible it does not follow that the method presented in this thread would be effective at doing so for a variety of reasons.
If it is difficult to directly detect the solar signal over the short term(and I agree that it is), it does not necessarily follow that it is difficult to detect over the long term. Check out the relationship to the movement of the ITCZ to the solar proxies over time for a good example of such amplification IMO.
In any case, there is no reason to say that all proposed means of amplifying the solar effect must also act (somehow) to also damp it. All we can really say is that we cannot detect an influence of the solar cycle on the temperature over the short term.
In any case, claiming that the game is over is way too premature.
Cheers, 🙂
Mann this thread will not end until the sun goes down….
1,ooo,ooo years a day in the life of a solar cycle.
The theory goes like this: Top down meets with bottom up drivers of global temperature. If the Earth is in an intrinsic bottom up oscillation to take advantage of the top down solar variable, it will amplify it. However if the Earth is in an intrinsic oscillation that is opposite the tiny solar variable’s ability to heat things up, you won’t see the signal in the temperature data. So it stands to reason that the solar signal is probably impossible to find in the short or long term, and therefore does not matter. It can be ignored as a scary scenario. Or a measurable one. Hell, the biggest solar variable only changes Earth’s temperature mathematically by a fraction of a degree. But those who like to impress with maths, go right ahead and calculate these other less energetic jump starter drivers you go on about. I would actually like to see it.
On the other hand one day without the sun, at what [temperature] would that news be given.
It was written down on banana leaves! And in many other places on the Earth. But even then, the temperature change was intrinsic to Earth’s atmosphere and its load of ash blocking the Sun.
Pamela, even if you are correct about the top down and bottom up drivers of global warming as you mention above, it does *not* follow necessarily that the solar signal will be undetectable nor that it will not matter. I could give a long, logical justification for this but it is really unnecessary. Take a look at the relationship between ITCZ(inter tropical convergence zone) and the solar proxies over thousands of years. Since solar changes can be shown to affect climate variables, arguments that they cannot do so or they do not matter seem rather moot to me.
Cheers, 🙂
Pamela Gary
Re the 1257 volcano.
We know from contemporary writings, church records and crop records that the climate of the 1250’s was already cool. Undoubtedly some months in 1257 or 1258 were affected by the volcano but the climate quickly recovered to pre 1250 levels.
There was a false start to the lia with a few cool decades towards the end of the 1200’s which cpincided with another couple oflarge eruptions, but it warmed up again with the second half of the 14th century being notably warm and 1362 possibly being the warmest year in the last two thousand.
We have no evidence except theoretical responses from tree rings and moss that the volcanos precipitated the lia.
Tonyb
Pamela
Sorry, but I seem to have given you a new surname. It’s a good one, can you keep it as that’s the one my iPad prefers?
Tonyb
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 10:43 am
The LIA was not caused by volcanic eruptions any more than were previous cool phases of the Holocene, such as the Dark Ages Cold Period. Cool phases have alternated with warm phases since the Holocene Optimum ended about 5000 years ago, as found in paleoclimatic observations from every continent.
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 8:40 am
TSI might not vary much, but its UV component does. Solar magnetic flux also shows larger than “tiny” variations. But it’s also true that the earth’s climate system can & does magnify relatively small fluctuations in solar inputs.
I am not convinced that the sun’s influence will result in an 11 year “heartbeat”. I think that the sun’s influence is more of a slow, long term pressure. In the current “weak” pattern, I think that the temperatures will be inclined to sag over time, verses the recent very active pattern where temperature tended to increase. It would be like putting a masive low pass filter onto the sun’s influence. The 11 year cycle would get filtered out.
Even in the balmy Early Cretaceous, a cold snap occurred on schedule with Shaviv et al’s cosmic ray hypothesis:
http://phys.org/news191527326.html
Kate Forney says (May 26, 2014 at 4:30) “I actually see a very useful process unfolding here — something akin to how I would imagine the scientific world working.“. Agree, and it applies in spades to everything that Anthony has provided with WUWT – genuine information, unedited access to data, open discussion, and always there’s the recognition that if the evidence were to swing towards CAGW we would hear all about it on WUWT. Regrettably, it isn’t how the formal scientific world works at all. That world is controlled by gate-keepers protecting their own turf and keeping score by number of papers published. As Max Planck said, “science progresses one funeral at a time”.
I agree with you about personal attack etc. There’s not much of it on WUWT, certainly compared with other websites, but some is inevitable given the volume of traffic. Although in this post of Willis’ I have explained what I think is a flaw (and I suggest a different way of progressing), please understand that I think Willis’ posts while not perfect are all enormously illuminating, and we would all be much poorer without them.
Earth’s magnetic field is important to climate change at high altitudes:
http://phys.org/news/2014-05-earth-magnetic-field-important-climate.html#inlRlv
Once again people, find the signal in the temperature data. Please. The rest is minutia. Is this really just an academic discussion related to incredibly insignificant temperature changes of a fraction of a degree or one that matters to those who want information on whether or not to put on a sweater when going outside?
You sound as frenzied as the CO2 folks! OMG!!!! It is .3% warmer than 30 years ago! Carry an umbrella!
Call me when these trivial changes matter to the point it shows up on my temperature sensor stuck to my backyard window.
milodonharlani says:
May 26, 2014 at 1:15 pm
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 10:43 am
Which is not to say that volcanic events of similar magnitudes during cold phases might be more devastating than during warm climatic intervals. Over any warm or cold cycle (if I may so designate these phenomena) there will be a number of major eruptions of various magnitudes. That was the case during the Late Bronze Age (“Greek Dark Ages”), Dark Ages (Migration) & Little Ice Age Cold Periods as well as during the Minoan, Roman, Medieval & Modern Warm Periods.
http://www.academia.edu/1411970/The_Influence_of_Climatic_Change_on_the_Late_Bronze_Age_Collapse_and_the_Greek_Dark_Ages
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 3:14 pm
IMO the point is that temperature changes attributed by CACA advocates wholly or mainly to CO2 can be better explained by variations in solar irradiance & magnetic flux.
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 3:14 pm
“Once again people, find the signal in the temperature data. Please. The rest is minutia.”
Respectfully, I think you are realizing that you are losing the argument here. Just because you can’t find the solar cycle signal in 350 years temperature data that all effects of the sun on climate are minutia. Did you even look at the relationship between the ITCZ and solar proxies like I suggested?
David A: Yes Mathew, but the affect on the atmosphere is the opposite of what one would expect. (More solar insolation in the SH summer = less atmospheric GAT)
Thanks, to you and to Richard S. Courtney.
I know that WUWT and Tallbloke seem to tweak each other’s blog. There is a discussion at Tallbloke “http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2014/05/19/solar-periodic-instability/”. One of the commenters points to URL “https://picasaweb.google.com/110600540172511797362/SOLARSYSTEMAndClimate#6015491995579189778” which indicates that there are is fast and slow sun instability of a mean Schwabe length of 10.54 to 11.4 years. I found the discussion about “Schwabe doublet and triplet waves” very interesting. Most of the interesting information and pointers in the comments. Unfortunately, I am still compiling my list of “quacks” and “trolls” so I could not eliminate all of them when reading comments.
The first encountered pathology must always be ruled out before continuing to search for a cause of disease. Why? It is often the strongest. A case in point. In my previous occupation, this was not uncommon: Some sweet lady in a nursing home has been told she has a tremendous hearing loss and must be fitted with expensive hearing aids. But if one were to otoscope the ear canal, wax impaction significantly skewed the results.
So in looking for the cause of ITCZ shifts, one would be wise to check something nearby with the muscle to move such a massive thing.
Our oceans and their teleconnections with atmospheric systems (IE trade winds, pressure systems, cells, etc) shove each other around. Easily. They are very powerful systems and vary a good deal over both short and long term time spans. ENSO processes can explain ITCZ shifts without considering solar variables.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=10&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CIcBEBYwCQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Fshadow.eas.gatech.edu%2F~kcobb%2Fseminar%2Fchiang00.pdf&ei=q-yDU63gMtStyASVwoL4Bw&usg=AFQjCNFMGGLJQwHfoINNc5eOVF7jGh5xJw&sig2=Ylae3ppGMfzh2wasT2rSQw&bvm=bv.67720277,d.aWw
Denying the effect of solar variations on climate reminds me of previous such denials in the history of science. It is just a pure accident that South America happens to look as if it fits into the ins & outs of Africa. It is just a pure accident that some shapes within rocks happen to look like bones & other parts of once living things & that stones that look like sea shells happen to occur atop mountains. Nothing to see here. Move along.
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 6:50 pm
You’re missing the point here. You can plausibly try and explain *short term* variations in the movement of the ITCZ in terms of the ENSO(also short term). What you can’t do is explain the **long term** variations in the ITCZ such as what has been done here:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277379106002265
To explain these long term variations in the ITCZ takes the solar connection that you want to insist is minutia or pathology. It is, demonstrably, neither. Fact is, unless you deal with **all** the evidence, *not just the stuff that supports your position*, your argument will continue to fail.
milo, what a silly analogy. You are better than that.
ENSO is short term only? Really. So the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, which is derived from ENSO data, and was first suggested by ship logs, is just a figment of my imagination, as well as that of ocean fisherman, Rocky Mountain fish and wildlife experts, and many agriculture scientists.
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 7:31 pm
I think it’s an apropos analogy, if not trenchant. I guess I’m not as good as you supposed, although I thank you for once thinking me so.
IMO in the not too distant future, historians of science will heap scorn upon d*n**rs of a solar influence on climate comparable to the laughs they now expect to raise deriding Wegener’s & Bretz’ 20th & Steno’s 17th century opponents.
With apologies to a neighbor whom I respect & admire (you), it is indeed the sun, on the best evidence. And the earth’s orbital parameters modulating what the sun provides. And varying cosmic ray flux, as modulated by the sun & as sent our way by virtue of our position in the galaxy. Plus other factors, very minor among which is CO2 concentration in the air, which is more an effect than a cause.
Downloadable article. Wonderful description of ENSO teleconnections. It may help the discussion here.
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/1520-0442%282002%29015%3C2205%3ATABTIO%3E2.0.CO%3B2
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 7:35 pm
The PDO is a climatic phenomenon, since it operates on a multi-decadal time frame. I don’t know if I would call the ENSO short term, but it doesn’t operate on the same time frame as the PDO, which admittedly is related to it.
IMO climate is a 30 year phenomenon, at a minimum. ENSO is annual to decadal, which makes it weather rather than climate. The average of its oscillations however is a climatic phenomenon, & is reflected in the PDO, discovered by a PNW fisheries biologist.
Milo, the PDO data is a derivative of ENSO data. It is a statistical down the line metric that reflects an ENSO oscillation central to the northern part of the Pacific.
From Wikipedia (I know, take it with a large spoonful of salt):
“The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is the leading EOF (empirical orthogonal function) of monthly sea surface temperature anomalies (SSTA) over the North Pacific (poleward of 20° N) after the global mean SSTA has been removed, [and] the PDO index is the standardized principal component time series.[1]
The PDO is detected as warm or cool surface waters in the Pacific Ocean, north of 20° N. During a “warm”, or “positive”, phase, the west Pacific becomes cool and part of the eastern ocean warms; during a “cool” or “negative” phase, the opposite pattern occurs. It shifts phases on at least inter-decadal time scale, usually about 20 to 30 years.”
It is derived from ENSO processes and SST anomaly data, meaning it cannot drive anything or be the cause of an ENSO event. It isn’t a thing. It is a statistic from ENSO event data. It is not a “climatic phenomenon” in itself. If it shows a multi-decadal oscillation, then the data used to derive it must also have oscillation swings of that magnitude.
Mike says:
May 26, 2014 at 4:09 am
Say what? Not true. I don’t delete anything. I’m a guest author, not a moderator.
w.
Notice that I say the PDO is derived from ENSO processes. Our Pacific Ocean systems are felt all over the globe. So if the PDO statistic is taken from global SST anomalies, it can be said to be derived from ENSO processes, in my opinion. Bob may say that is a stretch too far. I will bow to his superior knowledge in this area.
TimTheToolMan says:
May 26, 2014 at 4:32 am
Thanks, Tim. The UV no different at all from the sunspot data. Sunspots too are lower in some cycles and higher in other cycles
But the fact that there are more spots in some cycles and less in others doesn’t stop the sunspots from having ~11-year cycles, which my method detects. Similarly, the fact that UV varies, greater in some cycles than in others, doesn’t stop the UV from having ~11 year cycles, cycles which my method would detect.
w.
Bruce Murray says:
May 25, 2014 at 4:35 pm
beng says:
May 26, 2014 at 11:01 am
Mmm … basically correct with some mistakes. The eccentricity does indeed cause an increase and decrease in TSI, with peak insolation in early January and minimum insolation in early July. So far, so good.
However, the variation peak-to-peak is actually 20.2 W/m2 (per CERES measurements), not 90 W/m2.
In addition, there’s an oddity. You’d think the southern hemisphere would receive more solar energy than the northern hemisphere, because the SH is facing the sun when we are nearest to it, in the SH summer month of January.
But in fact, both hemispheres receive exactly the same amount of energy on average over the year … how can that be?
The answer is that when the earth is closer to the sun it’s moving faster in its orbit, and when it is farther from the sun, it is moving slower. As a result, we spend less time in the hotter area and more time in the cooler area, so the total amount of sunlight comes out the same.
It’s a curious universe indeed … in any case, beng, that’s why the variation in solar intensity from January to July mostly doesn’t show up in the climate records. They get counteracted by the corresponding variations in orbital speed.
w.
beng says:
May 26, 2014 at 11:01 am
Some are commenting that Willis’ “I hold that this shows that the temperature of the system is relatively insensitive to changes in forcing.” isn’t demonstrated in this post. Maybe not, but here’s a simple example of his statement.
The earth’s eccentricity causes 90 watts/m2 more sun-power to the earth in January than July (for comparison CO2 causes a few watts/m2 extra forcing worldwide so far). Yet there doesn’t seem to be any semi-annual signal in the temp data.
=====================================
and Willis says, that’s why the variation in solar intensity from January to July mostly doesn’t show up in the climate records. They get counteracted by the corresponding variations in orbital speed.
(Willis also asserted that the difference was only 20 watts/m2, as opposed to 90 in beng post.
===================================
And yet they do show up in the climate records, and it is far more complicated then the variation in orbital speed, which after all is not related to earths 24 hour rotation.
From here, http://www.applet-magic.com/insolation.htm
“The insolation per day is measured in kilowatt-hours of energy per square meter (kW-hr/m²). The rate of energy input varies from 1.412 kW/m² at the closest approach to the Sun to 1.321 kW/m² at the furthest. If an area is receiving energy at a rate of 1.4 kW/m² for one hour that is 1.4 kW-hr/m² of energy input. If its energy input falls from 1.4 kW/m² to 1.3 kW/m² for an hours then the combined energy received is 2.7 kW-hrs/m²”
So for top of atmosphere insolation beng appears to be more correct. However both beng and Willis appear incorrect in saying as Willis did, “the variation in solar intensity from January to July mostly doesn’t show up in the climate records” It does and quiet clearly.
The average temperature of the whole earth at perihelion is about 2.3oC lower than it is at aphelion, despite the fact that it is receiving immensely more insolation. This fact, where a strong solar signal shows up as a lower atmospheric T, should give pause for any expectation that a much smaller factor, the solar cycle would over only 11 years over only 11 years, show up against all the other disparate factors affecting GAT.
One reason the GAT is lower at perihelion is that the insolation is entering the far greater SH oceans, and so is lost to the atmosphere, as Konrad, Monckton, Richard Courtney, and myself have repeatedly pointed out.
“The average temperature of the whole earth at perihelion is about 2.3oC lower than it is at aphelion, despite the fact that it is receiving immensely more insolation. ”
Thanks, I’d never seen a figure expressed like that. Useful.
The thing is that SH hemisphere has greater heat capacity due to more water , so less temperature swing. So when you add everything together it’s larger temp swing of the NH that dominates the annual cycle.
NH is in winter at perihelion so global average is at a low.
This should also tell us something about ocean out-gassing and global CO2 variations which also peaks in SH winter. The January peak can be seen in MLO data: which is basically a 12mo and a larger 6 mo cycle added together.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=721
(Yeah, the orthodoxy has some hand-waving estimations about leaf rot in NH, mostly garbage IMO 😉 )
Willis, if you’re still reading comments, here’s a test to see under what circumstances, it’s possible to see a high frequency driving signal in a chaotic system. Try the Logistics equation x sub n+1 = r * ( 1 – x sub n), where r is a fixed consant. See the wikiepdia article for a lot of info on this equation. It produces various types of chaos for values of r somewhat less than 4. The equation produces a data sequence which we might consider an analog of global temperatures. The average value of x should not depend much on the initial condition, provided you are not very lucky and start with a reasonable value (try 0.5 or see the wikipedia article) and average over enough x sub n and call the average x-bar. Now it is possible to choose values of r that will exhibit no periodicity.
And changing r will change x-bar as is easy to verify. And so the natural math experiment is to change r periodically. For example, change r to be the high value for 6 samples and then low for 6 samples. Do you see the periodicity in the sample series? Or does the effect only happen in the average? And is the average changed at all?
The equation is deterministic and that means it’s going to do some crazy things. In particular, the series is truly chaotic only over a space of measure zero (assuming I recall this stuff correctly from 30 years ago). To avoid this, I’d be inclined to add a random number to each sample, say between +0.01 and -0.01. That might help avoid periodicity problems. And it should be done for a bunch of different pairs of r or ranges of r to see what kind of stuff is lurking out there.
Greg says,,,”The thing is that SH hemisphere has greater heat capacity due to more water , so less temperature swing.”
==============================
Yes, true, but understand the SH is not permanently losing that energy to the atmosphere. Energy cannot be destroyed. Said energy is for a time lost to the atmosphere as it enters below the surface of the ocean. This is why Konrad said the ocean should not be treated as a near blackbody as it is a three dimensional surface. The question I have asked, and thus far not had answered is ..”Is the earth gaining or losing energy during the SH summer? (I think, despite the higher albedo, it is gaining.)
Heat capacity of two different objects under equal radiation is a function of the residence time of the energies involved. The greater the residence time, the greater the heat capacity. Up to 1% of solar insolation penetrates up to 800′ into the dysphotic zone. (Which actually can extend to 3000′ deep). Each disparate WL of insolation has a different residence time. Most Oceans are 8 deg C at 600 m, 6 deg C at 800 m. The shorter insolation WL penetrate the deepest. Thus if you dive with a red object it quickly loses its color. The shorter WLs of insolation vary the most over the duration of solar cycles. However their residence time is the longest, in some cases centuries.
This is why it may well take several successive solar cycles unusually weak or strong, to manifest as a GAT in the atmosphere. This is also why the oceans may have continued to heat even after the very high solar insolation values ended in the 80s, as the following cycles were still well higher then the little ice age cycles, and the large heat capacity oceans had not yet reached equilibrium with these values.
“Only two things can affect the energy content of a system in a radiative balance; either a change of input, or a change of the residence time of some aspect of the energies within the system”
(Forgive me, but this is David’s law) To look for a very small change in solar insolation, which is mostly absorbed in the deep oceans, to manifest in ONE 11 year solar cycle, is, well let me say I am not surprised it is difficult to detect, as it is competing against many other climate factors.
However, have the earth undergo seven or eight successive strong or weak solar cycles, and this input differential will certainly manifest within the atmosphere.
Keep in mind this is not even considering the solar influence at the top of the atmosphere and potential jet stream changes and cloud cover flux. Those factors within the much reduced heat capacity of the atmosphere are likely to manifest in shorter time periods.
Willis,
I haven’t had time to read through all the comments to see if someone actually found a temperature dataset that shows an 11 year cycle. But I finally got in front of my computer and used the woodfortrees application to attempt to look for a cycle. I am not sure about the value of the frequency axis on their fourier analysis section so I made an overlay of Sunspot, Pmod and RSS and I think I have them sampled properly so I clealry see a bump on the RSS that lines up with the large spike on the PMOD and SSN. That is the 11 year cycle, it should be very weak, because of the one year cycle of earths elleptical orbit causing a 130 watt square meter variance each year, but that is about what I would expect to see.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/pmod/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/sidc-ssn/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/rss/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise
It is ths SUN
Willis,
I have had a thought about your periodicity analysis with regards to looking for the near 11-year signal in other climate data. I’ve tried finding this in the above comments, but with no luck (I did mostly skim and do control-f, though, so if this is a repeat, I apologize).
My thought is, based on other people’s works and comments, that we shouldn’t be looking at raw sunspot numbers as a proxy for energy, but rather as a proxy for the energy rate into the earth. The net energy is then the integral of the sunspot number. This was shown to provide good fits to temperature data in this post on HockeySchtick. I quote from that article:
If you take the integral of sunspot number (while subtracting an appropriate baseline value) and run the periodicity analysis, you don’t find the 11-month signal any more. I have an imgur album of images that shows this result. You can see my method for getting the baseline sunspot number in this album (which is just a re-hash of the hockey schtick post).
It is my belief that this is an avenue for further exploration. It allows for the sun’s influence to still be of interest, while explaining the lack of clear 11-year cycles in temperature and other data. If sunspot number is a proxy for energy input, then any temperature or other impact isn’t the result of the instantaneous energy input, but is more a function of current and past energy inputs (a simmering pot is hot not just due to the current low setting of a burner).
The integral of sunspot number helps us autoregress, in a way, against the past amount of energy being input to the system. It’s that net energy in the system that is more important, in my view, than the instantaneous energy flux that sunspots may be a proxy for. When that view is taken of sunspots, and the integral shows no 11 year periodicity for a given baseline, then it seems reasonable to me to conclude that we have an explanation for how the sun impacts the earth without showing an 11 year signal in the various climate/weather signals.
I have done cross-correlation of SLP, SST and MAT (marine air temp) against SSN
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=952
They all show some correlation to the 11y solar cycle. What is surprising is that SST shows both negative and positive lag correlation, whereas MAT and pressure show simple causal responses.
I’m not certain about this interpretation but I think it may suggest a resonance in SST to the 11y cycle.
James says:
May 27, 2014 at 6:52 am
That Hockey Stick model is interesting. I’d tried that sort of thing my self but never got as good a match as that. Though from memory the neutral value was about the same.
Integrating in that way does make sense since the Earth is integrating the incoming power.
It will not totally remove the 11y cycle but will severely attenuate it. That seems to agree with the correlation results I’ve found. There is a correlated signal but it’s fairly small.
James. What’s the “periodicity analysis” you do here? http://imgur.com/a/7kf8a#lq9RHQY
It’s interesting that the 21y region shows that same pattern as 11y. I’ve never seen that before. BTW there is still a rise around 11 in the integral version but it’s getting drowned by the oscillation. Not sure about your “periodicity analysis” .
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 8:39 pm
IMO the ENSO does affect the PDO. Warm (El Niño) water spreading north along the coast of the Americas would support the so-called positive phase of the PDO, which allows warmer water to enter the Arctic as well. But IMO the PDO also influences the ENSO, as in its positive phase there is cool water in the western Pacific, which could flow (slosh?) into equatorial waters, affecting the ENSO.
But IMO the main engine of the ENSO is the sun shining upon the tropical Pacific with intensities which vary over time, while also modulating cosmic ray flux, thereby affecting cloudiness.
Pamela Gray says:
May 26, 2014 at 7:35 pm
“ENSO is short term only? Really. So the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, which is derived from ENSO data, and was first suggested by ship logs, is just a figment of my imagination, as well as that of ocean fisherman, Rocky Mountain fish and wildlife experts, and many agriculture scientists.”
Please take a look at the link I provided previously as it will spare you *lots* of confusion. That link talks about changes in the ITCZ vs. solar over *thousands* of years. In that context, of course the PDO is short term.
It seems both Hadcrut3 and HadCrut4 Southern Hemisphere show the 11 year cycle as well
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/pmod/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/sidc-ssn/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/hadcrut4sh/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise
Shawnhet says:
May 27, 2014 at 8:14 am
IMO the climate of our water planet is largely controlled by ocean currents. Consider how & when the current Icehouse climate began (now about 38 million years old). Antarctica started developing ice sheets at the Eocene/Oligocene boundary, when that continent was finally isolated from South America & Australia by deep ocean channels.
During the Miocene, tropical & subtropical seaways still spanned the globe, which is why there was a Caribbean monk seal (now extinct) along with a Hawaiian monk seal & Mediterranean monk seal. (During the Pliocene the Med dried up thanks to plate collision at Gibraltar, but the monk seal’s ancestors survived in surrounding oceans.) This allowed warm currents to circle the planet, so Icehouse conditions were largely restricted to Antarctica. The Miocene was warmer than now, but less so than the Eocene & Paleocene Hothouse.
Even after the Tethys Sea closed in the Pliocene, warm currents flowed through the Caribbean from the Pacific to the Atlantic. The Arctic Ocean was still ringed by trees. Then about three million years ago, North & South America joined at the Isthmus of Panama, setting up glaciation in the northern hemisphere to match that on Antarctica.
Greg,
The periodicity analysis is based on this work. You can find the original paper there. I made python code that was just their modified matlab code. The periodicity power comes from their code in using the ‘projectp’ function, then getting the power of that projection from their ‘periodnorm’ function. The method will give high powers to periods that are multiples of lower periods with high powers. This makes sense in terms of periods. If there is a strong 11-year period, you can take a 22 year period (which is just two repeated 11 years) and stack that over the data, and it will look like a good fit.
I came across that method from a WUWT post, but for the life of me I can’t find it. I ran the M-best (corrected for larger periods) and put those images in the same album. Here’s the link for convenience (the new images are at the bottom). When the algorithm corrects for repeating periods, a 22-year period doesn’t show up. In the integral, the lowest period that shows up is at 12.5, so that might be some of that 11-year period coming through.
That imgur album is a bit rough, I just wanted to show the general process so people didn’t think I was completely pulling things out of thin air. The R-squareds are for the smoothed data, not the raw data, too. I have some other images not uploaded that only shows about .85 after fitting to raw data all the way through (sunspot integral + sinusoidal function with a period of ~70 years). I didn’t see any significant changes in the coefficients, which was enough to satisfy my curiosity at the time.
I hope this addressed your questions well enough.
Hi Milo,
I see the climate as influenced by a wide variety of things including ocean currents so I don’t really disagree. I am not sure I see how ocean currents could act independently, though. I would assume that the causation works something like the following – over time a sufficient of X(ie hot, cold, salty etc..) type of water builds up in Y location which causes Z ocean current patterns to develop.
In any case, allowing this does not prevent other patterns that affect climate to be taking place such as the connection between ITCZ location and solar activity I mentioned earlier.
Cheers, 🙂
I repeat changes in solar activity are quickly visible in the stratosphere. We shall soon see.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/intraseasonal/temp50anim.gif
Shawnhet says:
May 27, 2014 at 9:41 am
IMO ocean currents are driven by solar activity, among other factors, obviously, such as volcanic activity, plate tectonics, on various time scales. Climate’s control knob is not CO2.
carlbrannen says:
May 27, 2014 at 4:01 am
I tried that equation and it didn’t do anything like what you said. I looked at the wiki article, no help, might not be the right article. An hour wasted. Folks, please provide links to your claims. Just copy and paste the link in, WordPress takes care of the rest. Also, one worked example is worth ten thousand words. You try the dang equation and show us the actual results, I’m done wasting my time on your claim.
w.
Greg says:
May 27, 2014 at 2:36 am
The CERES data gives a figure very close to that, that we are 3.4°C cooler when we are nearest the sun. However, again I repeat, the total amount of energy the earth receives is independent of the distance from the sun. Yes, the TSI goes up and down as we approach and recede from the sun.
But the planet moves faster when it is nearer the sun, and slower farther away. So it spends less time in the hot zone, more time in the cold zone, and the two exactly cancel each other out!!
As a result, for example, the southern hemisphere faces the sun when we’re nearest the sun, which would make you think that over the year, the SH would receive more W/m2 on average than the northern hemisphere … but not so. They both receive exactly the same amount.
As others have commented, the difference lies both in the thermal mass and the relative areas of the ocean and the land. Only the skin of the land is warmed, while the ocean warms and cools deeply. As a result, while overall the planet is 3.4°C warmer in July (aphehelion, furthest from the sun) than in January (perihelion), the ocean is only 0.08°C warmer … but the land on average is a full ten degrees warmer in July, because so much of it is getting heated in the northern hemisphere. It is not widely recognized that disregarding Antarctica, there is about 3X as much land in the northern as in the southern hemisphere. In addition, the oceans are partitioned 40% / 60% north and south.
Here’s another oddity … disregarding clouds and assuming clear skies everywhere, which spot on the earth do you think would get the most hours of sunlight each year?
Regards to all,
w.
And last the PDO shows a very good anomaly at the 11 year cycle, I wish they had the non AU adjusted data for the PMOD so I could see were the one year cycle is. I guess I will have to write my own program to do the FFT, it really should be over sampled by a factor of 4 before you do the forward FFT, because it allows you to resolve the lower frequencies better. I suspect the PDO is interfering with the 11 year cycle. The PDO should show up as the strongest peak on the power spectrum for any dataset and the side lobes can interfere with the 11 year cycle if the data is not sampled fine enough.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/sidc-ssn/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/jisao-pdo/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/pmod/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 27, 2014 at 12:08 pm
SH is ~81% ocean; NH ~61%, for global average of ~71%.
Once again, there are those here who seem to think the PDO drives something. Folks, that is a step too far. It is an index derived from global SST anomaly data removed except from the North Pacific area, and then more statistical stuff is done to that data. So all the drivers have driven. What happens next and which part of the oceanic/atmospheric teleconnection drives the next happening is up for debate.
Ok so the Arctic Sea Ice shows that the one year cycle is centered at sample 35, the 11 year cycle is centered at approximately at sample 3 and the 30 year PDO cycle is below 1 and probably aliased in this analysis. The plot below shows that RSS global and Hadcrut4 Southern Hemisphere match the SSN 11 year cycle. The small peaks that follow the 11 year cycle on RSS and HADCRUT 4 are the longer than normal lag between cycle 23 and cycle 24, And the PDO index shows the strongest peak. So RSS, HADCRUT4 Southern and the PDO show the 11 year cycle.
What did I win? lol
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/sidc-ssn/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/jisao-pdo/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/nsidc-seaice-n/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/rss/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise/plot/hadcrut4sh/from:1979/fourier/magnitude/from:1/to:50/normalise
Willis: it would be the poles I suspect.
LT says:
May 27, 2014 at 6:23 am
First, let me congratulate you. You’ve done what so many folks don’t do. Instead of providing us all with the benefit of your opinions, hypotheses, and ideas, you actually went and got the data and looked at it yourself. Well done.
Having said that, there are a few problems with your analysis.
First, the datasets are too short. There’s only 32 years of data there in the shortest dataset. On my planet, I need a bare minimum of data which is three times the length of the cycle I’m looking for. In this case we’re looking for a cycle in the range of 10-12 years, so we need about 36 years of data.
Next, the datasets are different lengths. The PMOD data ends in 2011, and the other two go to 2013.
This makes a difference in the Fourier analysis. The “value of the frequency axis” is in units of frequency, where “1” is the base frequency, “2” is twice that frequency, “3” is three times the frequency, and so on.
The base frequency, in turn, is one cycle per dataset length. So if you have different dataset lengths, the base frequencies are different, and thus the numbers on the frequency axis mean different cycle lengths … no bueno.
To convert to cycle lengths, such as the 11-year sunspot cycle, you need to divide the dataset length (~33 years in this case, in fact 32 years for one and 34 years for the other two) by the value on the frequency axis. So “1” is 33 year cycles, “2” is 16.5-year cycles, “3” is 11-year cycles, “4” is 8.25-year cycles, and so on. You can see why I prefer my method …
In any case, here’s my analysis of the WFT data that you used. First, the data itself
I’ve trimmed the longer datasets to the length of the shorter one. Next, the periodograms:
Contrary to my usual practice, I’m showing cycles up to half the length of the dataset … in any case, the RSS data shows nothing in the range of 11 years.
All the best, you took a good shot at it,
w.
Pamela, I think the 30 year periodicity of the ocean surface temperature, pressure etc.., That cycle is what people refer to when they say that it drives multi decadal variations in global temperatures and precipitation patterns. It is difficult to draw a line in the sand when no human understands the cause of the 30 year periodicity, but it would seem logical that it is some type of deep ocean current system modulated by something. But the cycle is there nonetheless and it drives temperatures.
The cycle for which part? The North Pacific?
Willis,
What is causing the 2nd strongest peak on your RSS at approximately 11 – 12 years? The 11 year cycle would be very weak on a power spectrum.
Hey, Pamela –
Just curious but do you have a response for the link I provided that shows the movement of the ITCZ over thousands of years? Can the ENSO/PDO explain the apparent influence of the sun on that movement?
Willis said
“As others have commented, the difference lies both in the thermal mass and the relative areas of the ocean and the land. Only the skin of the land is warmed, while the ocean warms and cools deeply. As a result, while overall the planet is 3.4°C warmer in July (aphehelion, furthest from the sun) than in January (perihelion), the ocean is only 0.08°C warmer … but the land on average is a full ten degrees warmer in July, because so much of it is getting heated in the northern hemisphere.”
According to NCDC the global ocean is 0.6°C warmer in July (20th century average):
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/
Maybe there is more cold upwelling in the southern ocean during its summer.
I interpret the last spectrum you gave as proof of the 11 year cycle, the 5 – 7 year lobes are more than likely ENSO effects that have an average periodicity of 5 to 7 years, the 11 year cycle would be much weaker than the ENSO effects, so I think that it is it.
James says:
May 27, 2014 at 6:52 am
It’s an interesting thought, James. I use the integral of other series, notably the PDO, to determine the timing of regime changes. The discrete integral is also known, of course, as the “cumulative sum” of the data.
You need to be a bit cautious, however, as the result is very sensitive to the choice of where you are taking the anomaly from. If you take your anomaly about the zero point of the index (say the PDO index, for example), you get a very differently shaped integral than if you take your anomaly about the mean of the PDO index. My practice, at least for the first cut, is to take the integral using the anomaly about the mean of the data. One result of this is that the integral begins and ends at the same value.
With that as prologue, let me go see what the normalized integral of the sunspots taken about their mean might give us … hang on … OK, here you go …
w.
Greg Goodman says:
May 27, 2014 at 6:53 am
Interesting, Greg. I’ll have to take a closer look at that one.
w.
After looking at the analysis you did on OHC, it clearly shows the 11 year cycle too. I think you are expecting a large spike on the power spectrum but you will not get one, it will be very small, perhaps a small 3 DB variance is all you are going to get, as you know the 11 year cycle does not change the suns output by much from cycle to cycle. And neither does earths temperature.
Well, yes, but it is even worse than that.
Antarctica is 14.0 Mkm^2, surrounded by fixed ice shelves of 3.5 Mkm^2. + a minimum sea ice of 3.5 Mkm^2 = 21.0 Mkm^2 of “permanent reflective surfaces” (So the “permanent ice” around Antarctica = 4 % of the earth’s surface.)
The Antarctic sea varies between that 3.5 minimum up to 19 – 20 Mkm^2 maximum. (But that 20 mkm^2 of varying sea ice around Antarctica represents AN ADDITIONAL 4% of the earth’s surface – which ain’t “trivial” though!).
So overall, the Antarctic sea ice varies between 70 south latitude (at sea ice minimum) up to 59 south (at sea ice maximum.) The Antarctic land ice is essentially fixed between 70 south and the pole. Overall, there is no “land mass” at all as far as Antarctica goes, just varying amounts of “ocean or reflective ice” between 59 south and the south pole.
It is only the Australia, the larger part of South America, and the little bit of Africa that are south of the equator. Essentially none of those (obviously!) are ice-covered any part of the year. As i recall, the actual “exposed land area south of equator is right at 33.8 Mkm^2, or the size of the Antarctic total ice cap at sea ice maximum.
By eye (which may or may not be an effective tool!) it is not a 11-year simple cycle beat, but a pattern of 3 cycles high, 3 cycles lower, 3 cycles higher, 3 cycles lower of sunspot activity that repeats regularly. You could allow for a short lag delay, but over 33 years of rising influence, followed by 33 years of slightly declining influence, and any lag “spreads out” and would not necessarily be visible.
Thus, would not there be 33 higher period, and then a 33 year lower period that drives (yields!) the net 66 – 68 periodic cycle of temperatures that is seen superimposed on the far longer 450 year long term rise and fall of the past 2100 years?
Sorry Shawnhet, it’s your speculation. How do you think the Sun changes the ITCZ? I have already presented a paper that explains its movements. 1000’s of years ago our oceans and atmosphere were still working the way they do now. If you add in huge loads of ash and sulfur in the air there is more than enough power in intrinsic variables to cause ITCZ shifts. Your solar theory? Not so much. Not enough power to shift such a massive thing. But I would like to hear your speculative solar mechanism as you understand it.
My premise continues to be ENSO processes can explain ITCZ shifts without considering solar variables.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=10&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CIcBEBYwCQ&url=http%3A%2F%2Fshadow.eas.gatech.edu%2F~kcobb%2Fseminar%2Fchiang00.pdf&ei=q-yDU63gMtStyASVwoL4Bw&usg=AFQjCNFMGGLJQwHfoINNc5eOVF7jGh5xJw&sig2=Ylae3ppGMfzh2wasT2rSQw
RACookPE1978 says:
May 27, 2014 at 2:06 pm
For most if not all of the Paleozoic, most land was in the southern hemisphere. Those tectonic plates get around, even without throwing sea & land ice into the mix.
Well, Willis regardless is you realize it or not, you stand corrected the 11 year cycle shows up in your analysis as well as mine. I suppose it will take you some time to realize it.
Shawnhet says:
May 27, 2014 at 1:27 pm
OK, admittedly this is modeling, but at least the study mentions paleoclimatic data regarding shifts in the ITCZ. It finds that extratropical clouds (!) & ice contribute to movements of the ITCZ.
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00116.1
To me, that the air & waters north & south of the zone would affect it, as well as the ENSO, seems pretty likely.
Pamela,
I am talking about the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the one that causes the planet warm and cool in 30 year cycles. The one in which the Pacific emits more heat than it absorbs for 25 – 30 years and then switches phase, and then abosrbs more heat that it emits for 25 30 years. The cycle that no one understands what drives the mechanism.
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 27, 2014 at 1:46 pm
Thank you for the reply!
Yep. I just think it is more meaningful to talk about it as an integral. Even though we are using discrete approximations for the model, the real process is continuous and will ‘integrate’ in that sense.
Correct, and I am aware of the high variation in the integral, depending on the baseline sunspot number used. If the average sunspot number is used, then you can see a strong 11 year signal in the integral. That makes sense, though, because if the mean is right in the middle of a sin wave, the integral will be a cosine of the same frequency.
I did try it with that, and the fits were terrible. Picking the average sunspot value seems to me to push the baseline value too high, because means will be pulled up by highly active sun seasons. A highly active season might make us want to attribute more energy to them, an effect that the increasing mean would reduce.
The model I linked to and repeated, while rudimentary, gives a simple way of finding a baseline energy value. Under the assumption that sunspots are a proxy for energy input to the system, the optimizer tries to find out what sunspot number represents no net flux of energy in or out of the system (given the simplified form of the model, of course). I found the model to fit through the middle of temperatures well, and the residual was a ~70 year oscillation, which seems reasonable given the long term ocean oscillations. In other words, the model (in a super rough way) approximates energy flux for the earth as a whole, as well as an energy transfer process in the earth (oceans vs. atmosphere) that might explain further oscillations in atmospheric temperatures.
That’s all conjecture involving statistical models, so I’m not going to hang my hat on it or anything (I don’t even want to claim that I’ve shown something to be causal). You can do the exact same analysis with CO2 (and I have) and get fits that are just as good. The sunspot way assumes energy input to the system is what varies more, while the CO2 way assumes that energy retention is what varies more. Both have led to me to find models that shoot right up the middle of the temperature data and left me with a 50-70 year oscillation (with smaller ones, of course).
That’s a lot of rambling, but I wanted to justify the selection of the baseline value for the integral that wasn’t the mean, and also compare that to another option to provide balance. I think both physical mechanisms (energy intake and energy retention) are valid and working in combination.
My point was just to show that there is an interpretation of sunspots that allows for, in a data modeling sense, a relationship between the sun and temperature to exist that explains the lack of a strong 11 year cycle in temperature data. The short short version: I think you (Willis) are absolutely correct about not finding 11 year cycles in the data you haven’t found the cycles for. I just think that those findings don’t necessarily support a case for downplaying the sun. That’s certainly a matter of degree, though, and I’ll leave it up to climate and solar scientists to argue about the mechanisms.
Pamela Gray says:
May 27, 2014 at 2:43 pm
The oceans may have been working the way they are now but the ITCZ has been in quite *different* positions in the past than it is today. This is a pretty big problem for your hypothesis that you will have to deal with. Since the changes in those positions track pretty well with changes in the solar proxies and you have *no idea* how or why the ENSO might have changed in that time frame – I’d say that’s game, set and match to me 😉 You cannot wave away the good confirmation between solar and movement of the ITCZ by claiming that XYZ might have happened. Sure, gazillions of things might have happened but if they did this does not explain why *solar* correlates so well with it.
Again, the best hypothesis is the one that explains all the data not just the stuff that is consistent with your hypothesis – your hypothesis is missing some pretty big pieces.
I am frankly baffled at how you think the sun doesn’t have the power to affect the ITCZ – you are aware that the ITCZ moves during the year, aren’t you? I would claim that this is predominantly caused by the sun’s position during the year to get more or less sunlight – since you think that the sun is unable to cause this apparently – perhaps you can explain how you think it happens.
milodonharlani says:
May 27, 2014 at 3:14 pm
Thanks for the link, Milo. I’ll definitely take a look at it in more detail – it looks interesting 🙂
RACookPE1978 : By eye (which may or may not be an effective tool!) it is not a 11-year simple cycle beat, but a pattern of 3 cycles high, 3 cycles lower, 3 cycles higher, 3 cycles lower of sunspot activity that repeats regularly.
There no 60 in the SPD . The data is 80y and I’m using window fn that flat for 80% and cosine tapers each end.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=949
However, having noted the quadrature, if I do it the other way in integrate SSN, everything rises and correlates with sizeable 30 and 60y peaks.
Bearing in mind the window fn and the data length you may get something of that with a straight line so don’t make too much of it. In short it’s +ve around zero lag and -ve at each end which makes for some kind of 60y component.
The most significant correlation is +0.2 at zero lag, so there is a definite direct correlation between the integral of SSN and SST in Tahiti.
[30/60 or 33/66? .mod]
From LT on May 27, 2014 at 6:23 am:
I quickly found out you have a problem.
While RSS goes from 1979, and PMOD TSI from just a few months before that, the SIDC SSN goes back much further, to 1749. From 1979 is barely three sunspot cycles, hardly enough.
So as a quick check, I switched to HADCRUT4 for surface temps, and set from:1850 (start of HADCRUT4) except TSI where I just took the from out.
It’s not pretty. The SSN highest peak is at 15, twice as high as the 1 peak. 11 is the low point before the sharp upturn to 15.
And for some reason HADCRUT4 shows not only the expected 1 (annual) peak, but a 3 peak which is easily 5x higher than any others.
Using your call-out without the normalize, SSN only, and from 1749 to 2014, the very big peak shifts to 24.
The 11-yr cycle is in the sunspot data. Yet by doing what you’re doing but adding more of the data, the location of the peak keep shifting to a larger period.
This strongly suggests what you are doing is wrong.
Here’s what SST and MAT look like for the 5×5 grid around Tahiti:
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=953
What is notable is that there seems little justification for the post war meddling that the Met Office gets up to. Sure, there is an anomalous jump up in 1940 but if anything this seems to be bringing it back into line with MAT. If there was an “anomaly” it was BEFORE 1941.
There was an interesting treatment of the idea of integrating SSN, done in a more sophisticated way:
http://montpeliermonologs.wordpress.com/author/jpat34721/
http://montpeliermonologs.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/gregssag.png
I think he got bore or ran out of time, so it did not go as far as it could but the method was interesting.
From LT on May 27, 2014 at 8:59 am:
NO. SSN and HADCRUT4SH from 1850 still shows the peak shifted to 15-yrs, and nothing special happening to HADCRUT4SH.
From LT on May 27, 2014 at 12:13 pm:
DOUBTFUL. Going to 1900, start of the PDO dataset, SSN is still peaking at 11, and there is a PDO dip at 11. But there are many other more-severe drops, from 13 to 14 the PDO drops about twice as much, 20 to 21 is about 2.5x. Thus the significance of a possible solar connection look very small, and likely not significant at all.
And of course the cycle peak still shifts to 15 if the SSN data goes from 1850. I’m not aware of the Sun dramatically changing its cycles between 1850 and 1900, nor 1750 to 1850. So something is still wrong in your method.
From LT May 27, 2014 at 12:38 pm (now comparing with NH sea ice extent):
Large plate of Crow Quiche and an opportunity to try harder. Bon appetit!
Good heavens shawnhet, the fact that the ITCZ moves seasonally within the year is an intrinsic Earth factor! Hello!
“So something is still wrong in your method.”
I’m not surprised trying to use a tool like that to do it.
When I saw what an unintelligible mess the Fourier option was on WTF.org , I thought WTF ?!
That’s pretty typical. The only filter for years was the dreaded runny mean and super functions like “isolate” which subtracts the runny mean and tells what distortion you have left.
You cant even subtract two time series.
It’s not much good for anything beyond fitting linear models to data that has nothing linear about it.
That’s why I call it WTF.org , it’s not dyslexia, it’s like: WTF ??
kadaka, may 27,5:45pm…..really, not aware of cycles dramatically changing between 1750 to 1850….HELLO…what about SC4 to SC5, 18yrs from peak to peak!!Better save some of that Crow. And, oh yea, the earth experienced a cooling spell, but we all know it could absolutely not be the sun.
Gray et al 2013
A lagged response to the 11 year solar cycle in observed winter Atlantic/European weather patterns
[1] The surface response to 11 year solar cycle variations is investigated by analyzing the long-term mean sea level pressure and sea surface temperature observations for the period 1870–2010. The analysis reveals a statistically significant 11 year solar signal over Europe,[1] The surface response to 11 year solar cycle variations is investigated by analyzing the long-term mean sea level pressure and sea surface temperature observations for the period 1870–2010. The analysis reveals a statistically significant 11 year solar signal over Europe, and the North Atlantic provided that the data are lagged by a few years. and the North Atlantic provided that the data are lagged by a few years.
Pamela Gray says:
May 27, 2014 at 6:13 pm
“Good heavens shawnhet, the fact that the ITCZ moves seasonally within the year is an intrinsic Earth factor! Hello!”
Well, you’re half right. It is an Earth factor that changes *where and how solar energy hits the Earth*. As such, solar energy (distribution) effects where the ITCZ ends up. Hello?
Since we can now agree that solar energy changes can change the location of the ITCZ and that you have no response to the data that shows the ITCZ tracks solar proxies, I believe it is still game set and match to me.
I would hazard a guess than any and all of these lagged responses to an 11 year solar cycle could also be lagged to any other kind of event that is intrinsic to Earth. For example, one could back-track-lag temperature anomalies in Golf Stream coastal areas to an El Nino/La Nina series of events in the Pacific. Lagging seems to be the darling of all things solar. If you a looking for a solar signal, I am betting you will find it. Doesn’t mean your result is robust instead of spurious.
Shawnhet, you do no justice to your speculation when you move the cheese. The amount of solar energy that affects the Earth on a year to year basis is entirely an intrinsic factor. To hedge your bet on that one is silly.
Shawnhet, I have given you a well done study on intrinsic factors that affect the movement of the ITCZ that did not use solar variables in order to come to their conclusions. I believe this to be the superior hypothesis. The energy available to shift this zone around is clearly in intrinsic factors without the need of a yet to be discovered amplifying solar factor. I have postulated nothing else as you well know. To say in contrary to the written evidence that I now agree with you is a weak debating trick easily identified by debate judges and given low marks.
Kadaka,
I see what you mean, its impossible to know for sure what is going in the normalization of the FFT of different lengths with the woodfortrees software. It is intriguing enough for me to write a quick program to do the FFT. The satellite data should show the signal if it is there, particularly the stratosphere. I keep hearing little bits that 35 years is not enough data to see an 11 year cycle, and I know that is absolutely not true. I will write a program and see what I come up with. Willis’s program on the RSS shows a bump the is very close to the 11 year cycle, it looks encouraging to me. The Enso repsonse should have a complex periodicity that has side lobes that will interfere with the SSN cycle with only three cycle, but it still should show something. I know because I have used the sliding short window FFT many times to generate energy attenuation anomalie. The power spectrum will show energy of a partial sin wave, you just cannot filter it out without aliasing it, if you are using the FFT as a filtering operation.
Pamela Gray says:
“Shawnhet, you do no justice to your speculation when you move the cheese. The amount of solar energy that affects the Earth on a year to year basis is entirely an intrinsic factor. To hedge your bet on that one is silly.”
Look up the definition of intrinsic. The solar energy that hits the Earth is due to both extrinsic(the sun’s energy) and intrinsic(the shape of the Earth) factors.
“Shawnhet, I have given you a well done study on intrinsic factors that affect the movement of the ITCZ that did not use solar variables in order to come to their conclusions. I believe this to be the superior hypothesis. The energy available to shift this zone around is clearly in intrinsic factors without the need of a yet to be discovered amplifying solar factor. I have postulated nothing else as you well know. To say in contrary to the written evidence that I now agree with you is a weak debating trick easily identified by debate judges and given low marks.”
Unfortunately, for you, Pamela (and I mean this respectfully) your position is just not logical. Regardless of how well you think that the ENSO explains current, short term changes in the ITCZ (and I agree that it does so well), the ENSO cannot explain the long term(ie thousands of years) pattern of movements of the ITCZ. That is just a fact. Since a complete understanding of the climate needs to explain both short and long term changes in it, your theory is sadly lacking.
I was being a bit tricky in my language I suppose but clearly you are too. When you claim that the amount of solar energy that affects the Earth is (ie must be) intrinsic to Earth you are abusing the language to avoid dealing with the issue. That is why I used the language I did, so as to deny you these rhetorical tricks to hide behind.
IMVHO, Pamela, you should take this as a learning experience. It is quite clear that you have no way of addressing the long term changes in climate that certainly appear to be closely correlated with changes in solar proxies. Instead of hiding behind the definition of “intrinsic”, try to figure out what the link I gave you earlier was telling you. Maybe when you do understand that you might be able to rescue your ideas in some form but right now all you are doing is displaying the worst characteristics that you criticised in others throughout this thread. The long term data is not going to go away because you ignore it.
Cheers, 🙂
Shawnhet “IMVHO, Pamela, you should take this as a learning experience.”
Our Pam sounds like a member of the teaching profession. They are intrinsically refractory to learning, what they do is teach.
Once again, the changes in solar parameters are trivial compared to changes in Earth’s intrinsic variables. Comparatively speaking, those who propose solar sources of Earth temperature trends have a much harder case to prove in terms of energy available from relatively small solar variations and have yet to present plausible mechanisms compared to those of us who propose intrinsic variables that vary the amount of solar insolation at the surface, both in terms of long term and short term time spans. There are several well-done articles that demonstrate plausibility and mechanism going through the Little Ice Age and further back in time. I have posted many here over the years.
Wriggle matching and cylcomania are not at the same level as the papers I have often linked to in terms of exposing the sources of present and past temperature trends. It has nothing to do with me. It has much to do with which side is more thoroughly investigated, vetted with peer review, and plausibly explained. Intrinsic factors hold the upper hand in plausibility, and noisy short and long term temperature data and its proxies bury tiny mathematical solar forcings.
Shawnhet, unless you have another link for me, the paper you referred to is behind a paywall but attributes the cause of the proxy trends they uncover to decreasing solar insolation (which can happen even when the Sun is rock steady). The Earth is quite good at doing that. Volcanologist are now able to calculate aerosol load thus calculate solar insolation. Ash veils from super eruptions (along with their habit of continuing to burp and belch through their active stage) can explain reduced solar insolation. Oscillations in terms of increased cloud cover regimes are also very good at reducing solar insolation. And certainly going further back, changes in continental arrangements most definitely change weather and climate. All of these variables are intrinsic and calculably powerful enough to swamp solar variations.
Really, Pam, the above position remains illogical based on what we know of the history of the Earth’s climate. You cannot logically postulate that something that doesn’t change (what you call the “intrinsic” mechanisms) is solely responsible for something that does change (ie the long-term climate of the Earth). No amount of shucking and jiving will alter that at all.
You can claim that your data is better than other data presented here but, in truth, it is just more convenient for you to ignore other data. You cannot point to any actual flaws in my link (and don’t forget that their results are entirely with the entirely independent measurements of ice cores).
Pamela Gray says:
May 27, 2014 at 10:01 pm
Actually, it only talks about decreasing solar insolation for part of the record for some of the record the insolation is increasing. IAC, volcanism will not rescue your theory. If there was constant enough volcanism over the last 50,000 to explain these records, we would have plenty of independent evidence of that. We don’t have such evidence so we have to assume that there was no such persistent increase in volcanism.
Anyways, I applaud you for finally trying to figure out what the relevant paper says. I believe the following link should get you a free copy.
http://www.researchgate.net/publication/222398528_A_high-resolution_absolute-dated_deglacial_speleothem_record_of_Indian_Ocean_climate_from_Socotra_Island_Yemen/file/72e7e51837d0b5661e.pdf
If that doesn’t work just go to Google Scholar and search for “Holocene ITCZ and Indian monsoon dynamics recorded in stalagmites from Oman and Yemen (Socotra)”
That should get you started with the long term side of the issues.
LT says:
I see what you mean, its impossible to know for sure what is going in the normalization of the FFT of different lengths with the woodfortrees software. It is intriguing enough for me to write a quick program to do the FFT.
Changes in the stratosphere are causing waving, which changes the circulation in the troposphere. Just to see the strength of the winter polar vortex. Small its disruption causes a strong reaction on the surface. You should not focus on the temperature on the surface, but in the stratosphere, and changes in the UV.
http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/10hPa/orthographic=-260.78,-21.07,319
Regarding Willis Eschenbach says:
May 27, 2014 at 12:08 pm
======================================
I think Willis missed the implications (to the searched for 11 year cycle) of important observations regarding the seasonal changes. Willis correctly asserted that the earth spends less time when it is closest to the Sun in the SH summer. However the earth still rotates at the same rate. The difference in time has the affect of shortening the summer by two days, but each day is still 24 hours. During the ENTIRE SH summer, the earth is significantly COOLER despite the rate of energy input increasing from 1.321 kW/m² to 1.412 kW/m² at the closest approach to the Sun. (My earlier link showed insolation charts for both hemispheric summers.)
How is this cogent to the 11 year solar cycle? Well if about 90 w/m2 INCREASED insolation for several months is undetectable to the GAT, except in the fact that the GAT DROPS every time, then one might expect that a change of insolation of about 1 to 2 W/m2 over part of 11 years would likely be hard to detect. However, just as the much greater SH summer insolation fails to manifest as an increased GAT within the atmosphere, so might the highly active solar cycles SW energy bypass the atmosphere, and enter the long residence time oceans. It may take a 1/2 century or so of above active solar cycles, daily pouring their SW energy into the oceans, for the atmosphere to consistently register the heat energy that was pumped into the oceans for many thousands of successive days, 24 hours a day.
Not all watts are equal. The WL is critical to the heating potential.
1. Only two things can affect the energy content of any defined system in a radiative balance; either a change in input, or a change in some aspect of the residence time of the received energy.
2. The residence time of the energies involved is determined by the WL of the input, and the materials encountered. (It is the materials encountered that produce the surprising bi-annual changes discussed)
As an exercise in thinking about the above two laws please consider how differently the earth would respond if the SH summer had a TOA increase of 91 W/m² LWIR verses the total TSI spectrum. ( Some thoughts jump out. The ocean surface skin would absorb far more insolation, but the ocean depths. far less. The insolation would reach the atmosphere far quicker, but the residence time, and therefore heat capacity receiving that insolation would be far shorter, allowing much less accumulation.) I am certain other will have far more educated thoughts on this, but the lesson is in thinking about how all climate responses following the two laws.
Dominic Manginell said on May 27, 2014 at 6:45 pm:
Well, the peak between 1800 and 1810 is pretty jagged, and who would be foolish enough to think the highest monthly value must be the peak? So I’ll apply 5yr+1mo running mean smoothing for a better view.
Huh. The biggest peak-to-peak is only about 13 yrs. There is no “18yrs from peak to peak” anywhere here. Did someone do something amateurish like looking for max values around the peaks and finding the duration between, before looking at the data and seeing its shapes?
From Greg [Goodman] on May 27, 2014 at 6:34 pm:
Thankfully, as seen at WFT when you hit “Software” in the top toolbar:
And the ISO C++ source code is right there for the downloading.
So instead of merely loudly complaining about a free service, provided out-of-pocket by a private individual without government funding, YOU CAN CONTRIBUTE your great knowledge of mathematics and write better code and more functions, and make the entire site better.
Don’t just talk about change when YOU CAN BE THE CHANGE!
Wills, re: “I tried that equation and it didn’t do anything like what you said.”
See Chapter 2 of Robert Gilmore’s book:
http://einstein.drexel.edu/~bob/PHYS750_NLD/ch2.pdf
I got the above link from the links for his class on nonlinear dynamics (471/571 at Drexel):
http://einstein.drexel.edu/~bob/Physics-750_13.html
The logistics map is extremely important in chaos theory because it is so simple and yet it shows all the behavior of chaos seen in chaotic differential equations. But since it is iterative, it computes much much faster than a set of PDEs. And it’s simple to control (one variable) so it will be a nice workhorse for generating sequences of chaotic but deterministic data. By changing the value “a” in Gilmore’s chapter (or the value “r” in the wikipedia article) you can make the system exhibit any of the many types of chaotic behavior. You’ll have a blast playing with it. One of the things I did as a physics grad student at U. Cal., Irvine was to wire up some electronics that implemented the map. The result was that I was able to put the “spiderweb diagrams” (see figure 2.3, 2.4) onto an oscilloscope. By the way, it is possible to rewrite the logistics equation as a set of continuous differential equations, at least to any given degree of accuracy; thus the behavior seen in it is not unique to this being a simple iterative equation. Sets of partial differential equations do the same thing.
If you have any problems with this, send me an email carl at sign brannenworks dot com, this is a subject I’ve done some stuff in and can help. I prefer to use java as a programming language (hence I like to use math techniques that are computationally friendly).
I’ve given some (not a lot) of thought to the cross-correlation plots.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=952
Firstly the magnitudes are very small but due to the integrating capacity of the oceans this may be expected. As noted there is more than a passing resemblance between the cumulative sum of SSN and global temps. Correlations on intSSN are much more significant : 0.2
So could it be random? If you take while noise and CC with a signal that has one major peak it could produce something of this order. So perhaps the SST line is just that. Though I don’t see a reason why it would have a phase which is orthogonal. Perhaps some Monte Carlo tests would shed light.
However, the clear onset of a causal response in MAT and SLP does not seem to fit that kind of explanation even though the amplitude is small.
Now if there is a strong atmospheric feedback, acting to counter changes in SST, this may tie in with what is found.
My hands on knowledge of tropical climate is somewhat limited and I’ve never lived there long enough to get an understanding of the climate. I suspect Willis is much better equipped to comment on all this.
What seems clearest in all this is the anti-phase between SST,MAT and SLP. In temperate climates, high pressure is generally associated with clear sunny weather and a drop in surface pressure presages rain or stormy weather. The tropics may well be very different, I don’t know.
However, if SLP drops with higher temps, this seems like observational numerical evidence of Willis’ regulator hypothesis. That needs someone with a knowledge of the meteorology of the tropics.
“Don’t just talk about change when YOU CAN BE THE CHANGE!”
Great in principal but I’ve contacted Paul years ago and he’s not really interested in other people’s ideas. I’ve wasted enough of my life attempting to contribute code to open source projects to know that it takes ten times more effort to convince someone that their gift to the world is not already perfect, than it does to do the coding to make an improvement.
One of the rare exceptions is gnuplot. An amazingly responsive project. I’ve contributed code and ideas that have been adopted over there. So I suppose, indirectly, I have contributed the WTF already.
There is plenty of independent confirmation that during the LIA there were 4 major pulses of volcanic eruptions that nicely match the temperature proxies. And the mechanism is plausible. However, back to the issue. Here is another paper on shifts that demonstrate non-solar teleconnections intrinsic to Earth.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=3&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CD8QFjAC&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.atmos.washington.edu%2F~aaron%2Fnobackup%2Fpapers%2FITCZ_revised.pdf&ei=8NSFU77fEdanyASg9YLQAg&usg=AFQjCNHw0vePcE46LHqiWLNa8sDmvrg6tQ
It seems to me that, once again, these shifts do not have a plausible solar mechanism and can be explained using intrinsic factors.
A paper that brings forth a connection with solar insolation may be the thing that is tripping you up. Solar insolation is not the same thing as TOA solar irradiance. Insolation can vary depending on where it is measured and over what period while TOA solar irradiance and proxies of irradiance will be a remarkably stable metric during that same time period. For example, solar insolation during the LIA can be reasonably calculated based on sulfur and ash atmospheric load (I have linked to that paper before) and can be compared to solar irradiance proxies of the same period demonstrating this difference.
Pamela Gray
Yes, the temperature PROXIES! Tree rings, corals, ice cores?
Dr Mann wrote an elaborate paper as his tree rings didn’t show the 1257 volcano cooling and he wanted to demonstrate why.
The actual observational evidence from the time do NOT show the prolonged cooling. The worst volcanic events may cause a season or two cooling, dependent on their size and location. Quite often the cooling has already been occurring and the volcanic events are merely a continuation.
Nasa confirms there is often winter warming.
Now, who do I believe? Crop Records, Church records and contemporary observations or tree rings?
tonyb
Shawnhet, I read the paper you linked to (and thanks for the link). Extrinsic solar mechanisms are not mentioned (solar insolation is an intrinsic factor). Instead the paper focuses on teleconnections and solar insolation, a reasonable set of mechanisms. Did you mean to link to another paper?
I think we will see a lot more about the beginnings of the LIA and volcanic connections reducing solar insolation. Now that the source has been reasonably identified and calculations made, a much more accurate picture is emerging regarding plausible initial volcanic triggers playing a role in the beginning of the LIA. Stay tuned. I hope that researchers are looking into possible connections with equatorial ENSO recharge disruption as well as other teleconnections to plunging temperatures that then seesawed with additional volcanic eruptions throughout the LIA period.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCgQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Flgge.osug.fr%2FIMG%2Fpdf%2FCVidal19-03-2014.pdf&ei=YfCFU4D0AY6NyATo_YD4DA&usg=AFQjCNHTQy31CoMDvZ31U5XwWoLnZb6-lQ&bvm=bv.67720277,d.aWw
Pamela Gray says:
May 28, 2014 at 5:49 am
“Shawnhet, I read the paper you linked to (and thanks for the link). Extrinsic solar mechanisms are not mentioned (solar insolation is an intrinsic factor). Instead the paper focuses on teleconnections and solar insolation, a reasonable set of mechanisms. Did you mean to link to another paper?”
Come on, Pamela. Just because you say that insolation must be an intrinsic factor doesn’t make it so. Seriously, how do you think they are even able to **detect** that insolation changed at all over this timeframe? It sure wasn’t by detecting some intrinsic mechanism *that isn’t operating now and noone knows anything about*.
In point of fact, the changes in insolation are inferred from the changes in radiogenic particles in the over time. See here for a paper that makes this clear. http://www.researchgate.net/publication/10708530_Holocene_forcing_of_the_Indian_monsoon_recorded_in_a_stalagmite_from_southern_Oman/file/72e7e51837d0c8b11c.pdf
Now, unless you have some radical new theory that explains how carbon 14 can be intrinsically generated by the Earth and somehow moved to show up in the atmosphere in the levels shown on that paper, there is really nothing else that needs to be said.
Pamela
The observations and records simply don’t tally with the theory. Here under is a prolonged extract from the accounts of 1257/8. Undoubtedly there was a bad year then but the previous few years had ALSO been bad! Very soon after the volcano erupted the climate returned to normal.
There were then decadal swings from warm to cold and back again with the warmth dominating , with 1361/2 being possibly the hottest year on record. The climate declined from around the early 15th century but then picked up again in the first half of the 16th century . In other words the early stages of the LIA were episodic with the worst periods at the end of the 16th early 17th and late 17th century.
The crop records confirm this.
here is the extract;
1253 dry summer and wet autumn with in spring and summer a prolonged drought. Flooding in autumn which dried up after the feast of St Michael happened in spring (drought) contrary to the nature of the season, for at the time of the equinox with the whole weather moderate there is customarily peace in the elements
Brooks and glasspole believe 1252 and 1253 to be the driest of which we have any historical account; see Meteorological magazine 63 1928, page 4.
1254 cold weather in jan and feb ceasing on march 12th. ‘ Mathew paris notes ‘also on this day march 12th the bitter frost ceased which had continued nearly the whole winter that is since the night of the circumcision. ‘
Much north and easterly wind continually blowing in the spring for three months and several days which blasted the flowers and fruit about the calends of july namely in the time of the solstice quite suddenly inundations of rain broke forth with very violent hail of a kind not seen before which lasted for an hour or more breaking off tiles and parts of houses and stripping branches of trees.
M paris notes; Very unseasonable summer from the day of ascencion to the feat of all saints hardy two or three serene days passed without continual disturbance of the air.
In the autumn all the ground bounded by and in the neighbourhood of the sea which they had sown diligently was saturated by salt and found to be devoid of crops as the sea had occupied the land during the winter time
1255 gales in feb and march. From the feast of st valentine for a month a violent wind with heavy rains day and night both by land and sea caused unheard of disturbance.
There was then very unsettled weather the north wind blowing nearly the whole spring which is very inimical to the flowers and sprouting trees. And through the whole of april neither shower nor dew moistened the dry earth or gave it any warmth. The air was parched by the blowing of the north and east wind.
In this summer there was a drought due to the east winds continuing from mid march to the calends of june.
Rain followed and on the third of the ides of july a great tempest of hail in the trent valley marvellously beyond the ordinary nothing like it had been seen before with widespread destruction of crops by floods of water in the valley of the trent such as had not happened for a long time
1255/6 a great gale and rain the whole winter from the feast of all saints until whitsun-this is likely to refer to nov 1st 1255 to june 4th 1256
1256 severe thunderstorms july 25 gales on oct 5th and oct 26th which was unprecedented overturned houses and shook down stones. Possibly duplicates a great storm from oct 26th 1254
Another thunderstorm on nov 16th and on dec 28th, this latter one was very severe with much flooding it was accompanied by a fierce whirlwind. ‘the thunder sounded a sad prophecy for it was in the middle of winter and the cold was more like that of February. Unsettled weather then lasted for three months.
1257 from the first day of February until the first of may the whole of england was turned into a bog and a quagmire by the turbulent winds and the foul storms. (this description might refer to 1256)
Excessive rains in summer with much flooding destruction and loss of hay. Another chronicler noted that before the octave of st benedict there commenced such floods of rain that the earth was downed bridges houses and mills borne away, roads made impassable. Probably lasted until august as some crops were saved.
Mathew paris notes; the past year was sterile and meagre whatever was growing was choke by the floods of autumn for there was neither a temperate nor a serene day nor was even the surface of the lakes hardened up by the frost as is usual, nor were icicles hanging but there were continued inundations of rain until the purification of the blessed virgin
1258 the serene air of autumn and its temperateness continued until the end of January so that nowhere and at no time was the surface of the water frozen up. But from that time to the end of march the north wind continually blew frost snow and intolerable cold prevailed the face of the earth was bound up cultivation was suspended ad young cattle were killed.
The north wind blew continually, when april may and the principal part of june had passed the flowers of plants had scarcely germinated.
Great tempest of flooding rain, snow ice thunder and lighting on the 12th of june causing great flooding on the river seven around bristol and Shrewsbury. Much loss of life. Note; This might refer to 1259.)
General scarcity and expense of wheat due to inundations of previous year. In 1258 autumn crops nearly rotted by autumn rain. Very late and tedious autumn on account of the continual and persistent rains.
Matthew paris notes; now this past year was very dissimilar to all previous years that is it was unhealthy and mortal stormy and exceedingly rainy so much so that although in summer time the harvest seemed promising by the time of autumn continual heavy rains choked the crops .
Terrible thunderstorm on december 1st.
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/09/26/1307520110 Mount Rinjani erution probably May to Oct 1257
http://news.nationalgeographic.co.uk/news/2013/09/130930-volcano-science-historic-eruption-indonesia-rinjani-mystery-disaster/
http://www.volcano.si.edu/
(volcano info provides a spread sheet of eruptions as excel-saved as ‘volcanos’
1259 everything grew in moderate abundance and the dry weather presented an unexpected sufficiency.
1260 great and prolonged summer drought so that barley and oats remained hidden in the ground even until autumn . however showers then caused germination but they didn’t ripen due to lack of warmth.
——- ——–
There is no observational evidence for the theory propounded. The 1257/8 volcano did not precipitate the LIA nor the ones that followed soon after.
Have you read DR Mann’s paper in which he tries to explain why his tree rings didn’t pick up the volcano signal?
tonyb
I have to say that intrinsic in this context, is just a fancy word for “clueless”.
hmmm. There are other reasons for your variation in carbon isotopes. Look at slide 21 in this link:
http://books.google.com/books?id=vsxIsLcB_xUC&pg=PA303&lpg=PA303&dq=solar+insolation+and+radiogenic+particles&source=bl&ots=Tec8lNL-yb&sig=V5gJWRC1pQUJGVkbl7FV9k2Tzzw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=AwWGU8q7EIihyASV7ILQDQ&ved=0CGsQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=solar%20insolation%20and%20radiogenic%20particles&f=false
For further reading, I would recommend this book:
http://books.google.com/books?id=vsxIsLcB_xUC&pg=PA303&lpg=PA303&dq=solar+insolation+and+radiogenic+particles&source=bl&ots=Tec8lNL-yb&sig=V5gJWRC1pQUJGVkbl7FV9k2Tzzw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=AwWGU8q7EIihyASV7ILQDQ&ved=0CGsQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=solar%20insolation%20and%20radiogenic%20particles&f=false
oops. Here are the slides to a very good powerpoint. Look at slide 21.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=6&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CFkQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmason.gmu.edu%2F~bklinger%2FCLIM690%2Flec9_paleo.pdf&ei=IgiGU6yHOI2qyAS0zYGwCw&usg=AFQjCNEIE7pWV12ImGlxV-DwhRzT_OGKyQ&sig2=3CjXFeIRmQ9wEgToEq9iDw
Geez, Pam. Throw me a bone here. I can’t even see your slide 21 in the whole book. How about a page number and a bit of context? Everything I’ve read suggests that *perhaps* carbon 14 can change *a bit* due to climactic effects but it definitely will change due to changes caused by the sun.
What specifically are you saying is happening? It seems like you are just trying to dodge the issue again.
Shawnhet says:
May 28, 2014 at 9:30 am
Geez, Pam. Throw me a bone here. I can’t even see your slide 21 in the whole book. How about a page number and a bit of context? Everything I’ve read suggests that *perhaps* carbon 14 can change *a bit* due to climactic effects but it definitely will change due to changes caused by the sun.
The Sun’s magnetic field modulates the cosmic ray intensity, but a MUCH larger modulation is due to variations in the Earth’s magnetic field.
Ok, just to keep track of where we are here:
1. Do you agree that when my Neff paper claims that solar insolation correlates well with the movement of the ITCZ, they are talking about the change in solar insolation *caused by the sun* and not some hypothetical “intrinsically” caused insolation change?
2. Since you apparently think that the Neff paper is only detecting changes in the Earth’s magnetic field, what is your explanation for how changes in the Earth’s magnetic field can affect the movement of the ITCZ? Do you have any data that supports your hypothesis?
Probably not exhaustive list of major volcanic eruptions during the latter Medieval Warm Period & LIA (from Wiki, FWIW):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Quaternary_volcanic_eruptions
1) Mount Tambora, Lesser Sunda Islands, Indonesia; 1815, Apr 10; VEI 7; 150 cubic kilometres (36 cu mi) of tephra;[2] an estimated 10-120 million tons of sulfur dioxide were emitted, produced the “Year Without a Summer”[23]
2) 1809–10 ice core event; an unknown eruption at a near-equatorial location and a magnitude roughly half that of Tambora, emission of sulfur dioxide around the amount of the 1815 Tambora eruption (ice cores from Antarctica and Greenland).[24] In the year 1808, there were also major eruptions in Urzelina, Azores (Urzelina eruption, fissure vent), Klyuchevskoy, Kamchatka Peninsula,[25] and Taal, Philippines.[26]
Note: Thompson Island, Northeast of Bouvetøya, South Atlantic Ocean, disappeared in the nineteenth century.[27]
3) Grímsvötn, Northeastern Iceland; 1783–1785; Laki; 1783–1784; VEI 6; 14 cubic kilometres of lava, an estimated 120 million tons of sulfur dioxide were emitted, produced a Volcanic winter, 1783, on the North Hemisphere.[28]
4) Long Island (Papua New Guinea), Northeast of New Guinea; 1660 ±20; VEI 6; 30 cubic kilometers (7.2 cu mi) of tephra[2]
5) Kolumbo, Santorini, Greece; 1650, Sep 27; VEI 6; 60 cubic kilometers (14.4 cu mi) of tephra[29]
Huaynaputina, Peru; 1600, Feb 19; VEI 6; 30 cubic kilometres (7.2 cu mi) of tephra[30]
7) Billy Mitchell, Bougainville Island, Papua New Guinea; 1580 ±20; VEI 6; 14 cubic kilometres (3.4 cu mi) of tephra[2]
8) Bárðarbunga, Northeastern Iceland; 1477; VEI 6; 10 cubic kilometres (2.4 cu mi) of tephra[2]
1452–53 ice core event, New Hebrides arc, Vanuatu; location of this eruption in the South Pacific is uncertain; only pyroclastic flows are found at Kuwae; 36 to 96 cubic kilometres (8.6 to 23.0 cu mi) of tephra; 175-700 million tons of sulfuric acid[31][32][33]
9) Mount Tarawera, Taupo Volcanic Zone, New Zealand; 1310 ±12; VEI 5; 5 cubic kilometres (1.2 cu mi) of tephra (Kaharoa eruption)[2]
10) Quilotoa, Ecuador; 1280(?); VEI 6; 21 cubic kilometres (5.0 cu mi) of tephra[2]
11) Samalas volcano, Rinjani Volcanic Complex, Lombok Island, Indonesia; 1257; 40 km3 (dense-rock equivalent) of tephra, Arctic and Antarctic Ice cores provide compelling evidence to link the ice core sulfate spike of 1258/1259 A.D. to this volcano.
Dunno how complete the list is, but note that there was a drought around the time of the onset of the LIA, ie between the VEI 5 & VEI 6 eruptions of AD 1310 & 1477. Toward the end of the Medieval Warm Period, c. 1250 to 1350, climate was becoming less stable (some date the LIA as 1350 to 1850; NASA shortens it to 1550-1850, while others think it lasted a little farther into the second half of the 19th century). Notable during the phase of instability was the Great Famine of 1315-17 in northern Europe. Population had greatly increased during the MWP, making normal weather fluctuations more deadly & setting the world up for the Black Death. Wars like the Hundred Years’ in France didn’t help.
The Dark Ages Cold Period which preceded the Medieval Warm Period also featured volcanic eruptions, but so too of course did the MWP & every other warm & cool phase. IMO there is no statistically significant difference between major eruption frequency or power during the two cycles. The late LIA had VEI 7 Tambora, but the Modern Warm Period has had Krakatoa & three other VEI 6 eruptions, for instance. The Medieval Warm Period featured not only the alleged 1257 event & VEI 6 Quilota, but the earlier VEI 7 Tianchi (c. 969) & VEI 6 Ceboruco (c. 920, but not well dated) eruptions. There was also a VEI 6 at c. AD 800.
Actually, there were no recorded VEI 7s during the Dark Ages Cold Period, unless you count Taupo of c. AD 230, although it had its usual share of VEI 6 eruptions.
LT says:
May 27, 2014 at 3:05 pm
Thanks, Lt. Unfortunately I have:
1) no idea what your analysis is, and
2) no idea where to find your analysis, and
3) no idea where in my analysis you claim the 11-year cycle “shows up”, and therefore,
4) no clue what you are on about.
So I don’t know whether I “realize it or not”, because I don’t even know what “it” is on your planet.
Folks, without links, this kind of post is just useless childish babble. I’m not going to go look for your genius work, LT, that’s a fools errand. I’m not going to search the thread to see if I can guess what the heck you are referring to, that’s a mug’s game.
Come back next time with something more in your hand than your Johnson, and we’ll talk.
DEAR FRIENDS, PROVIDE LINKS AND QUOTES SO WE CAN TELL WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT!!!
You may be 100% right, LT … or you may be 100% wrong, but without links there is no way to know.
w.
Observed Tropospheric Temperature Response to 11-yr Solar Cycle and What It Reveals about Mechanisms
Jiansong Zhou and Ka-Kit Tung
Using yr of NCEP reanalysis global data from 1000 to 10 hPa, this study establishes the existence and the statistical significance of the zonal-mean temperature response to the 11-yr solar cycle throughout the troposphere and parts of the lower stratosphere. Two types of statistical analysis are used: the composite-mean difference projection method, which tests the existence of the solar cycle signal level by level, and the adaptive AR(p)-t test, which tells if a particular local feature is statistically significant at the 95% confidence level. A larger area of statistical significance than that in previous published work is obtained, due to the longer record and a better trend removal process. It reveals a spatial pattern consistent with a “bottom up” mechanism, involving evaporative feedback near the tropical ocean surface and tropical vertical convection, latent heating of the tropical upper troposphere, and poleward large-scale heat transport to the polar regions. It provides an alternative to the currently favored “top down” mechanism involving stratospheric ozone heating.
steven says:
May 28, 2014 at 12:02 pm
Thanks.
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JAS-D-12-0214.1
Cited by
Stergios Misios, Hauke Schmidt. (2013) The role of the oceans in shaping the tropospheric response to the 11 year solar cycle. Geophysical Research Letters 40:24, 6373-6377.
Online publication date: 28-Dec-2013.
CrossRef
Lesley J. Gray, Adam A. Scaife, Daniel M. Mitchell, Scott Osprey, Sarah Ineson, Steven Hardiman, Neal Butchart, Jeff Knight, Rowan Sutton, Kunihiko Kodera. (2013) A lagged response to the 11 year solar cycle in observed winter Atlantic/European weather patterns. Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres 118:24, 13,405-13,420.
Online publication date: 27-Dec-2013.
CrossRef
K.-K. Tung, J. Zhou. (2013) Using data to attribute episodes of warming and cooling in instrumental records. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 110:6, 2058-2063.
Online publication date: 5-Feb-2013.
CrossRef
What a novel idea to use data.
So there is some evidence that solar may force ocean heat transport. Does it matter?
Increased ocean heat transports and warmer climate
D. Rind M. Chandler
We investigated the effect of increased ocean heat transports on climate in the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) general circulation model (GCM). The increases used were sufficient to melt all sea ice at high latitudes, and amounted to 15% on the global average. The resulting global climate is 2°C warmer, with temperature increases of some 20°C at high latitudes, and 1°C near the equator.
Pamela Gray says:
May 28, 2014 at 5:38 am
Good to remind us all of the distinction between insolation at the surface & irradiance at the top of the atmosphere. That’s why I consider cloudiness important, & energy actually delivered to land & especially sea, in which stratospheric ozone levels play a role.
Willis,
You have it right in front of you, you said there was nothing on RSS when there is clearly a peak at about 11.5 years on the RSS. If you were expecting a large spike there you are not going to find one.
http://i1240.photobucket.com/albums/gg484/ltwells3/WillisRssEvidence_zps92266c52.png
The Strongest cycle should be the 60 year (+/- 20) year for PDO, then the next strongest would be a 5 – 9 ENSO, which you show and then a somewhat weaker 11-12 SSN cycle which you show.
Willis,
You should at least make an educated guess about what you would expect to see on a power spectrum, before dismissing the evidence and then ranting about it in a blog. You made the claim that the Sunspot Cycle is the biggest cycle, that is false, its a very small cycle when looking at Earths temperature response, compared with all the other cyclical variations that modulate earths temperature. It should be the smallest peak on any power spectrum. Furthermore you have only discovered the FFT less than 60 days ago. I have been using it for almost 30 years. 33 years of data is more than enough data for an 11 year cycle to show up on a power spectrum, people often confuse the sampling theorem, when it comes to using the FFT as filtering operation vs. using the power spectrum to identify a cycle.
LT, statistically it would not be sufficient. How would you determine significance?
lsvalgaard says:
May 28, 2014 at 9:42 am
The Sun’s magnetic field modulates the cosmic ray intensity, but a MUCH larger modulation is due to variations in the Earth’s magnetic field.
——————————-
How about a correlation probably without any causation?
I note that the geomagnetic field drifted eastward from about AD 1000 to 1400 (during the MWP) & westward from then until now (LIA & Modern Warm Period). But dipole strength has been falling since c. 1850, which should let in more GCRs, making the surface world cloudier & cooler (at least during the day), not warmer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Magnetic_North_Pole_Positions.svg
That plot (for the positions of the north magnetic pole from 1600 – 1900 (proxies I assume) and measured points 1900 – 2007 indicates that the 1600 and 1700 points were fairly close to the 1960 – 1970 points (further west of the modern points though), but everything since 1980 is way, way further north than anything earlier.
The very rapid movement doesn’t even seem to match the “pause” unless the north magnetic pole’s movement north is counter-acting the rise in CO2. ??? But how would that happen?
More important, how much closer to Russia is the pole now in 2014? Up past 85, 86 north? Odd that the available image dat and maps seem to stop 2 – 4 years ago.
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 26, 2014 at 2:42 am
“Without having the data, my comments are:”
“1) LINKS! LINKS TO THE EXACT DATA! Your graph is useless without that.”
Here is the exact data I used. (I posted it above) The temperature data is from the UK met office and the SSN is from Greenwich. I can give you an exact link if you want.
http://thetempestspark.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/stornoway-nov-ssn-v-mar-tmin-1875-2009.xls
“2) What is the correlation between the raw datasets?”
“3) What does the cross-correlation look like for all months lag?”
I’ve looked at various combinations over the historical temperature data that the UK met office provides the public, and the correlation is there between ssn and temperature. Stornoway is an example. (you know, when people post a graph, you are able to display them).
“4) Why just November and March?”
It isn’t, nor is it only in one local UK region either.
“5) The centered moving average is a horrible thing. It munges the data mightily. And when you are looking at sunspot data, the 11-year centered moving average is the absolute worst choice possible. See “Sunny Spots Along The Parana River” for a full discussion of these issues.”
I agree, statistical sequencers assume that their function/s are correct, I prefer a manual approach to math, at least until I can confirm that a function is correct or not. This is why I have produced this graph from scratch just for you, because it is reproducible, it shows a ‘horrible’ trend correlating between sunspot and regional UK temperature.
“Thanks, getting closer …”
I appreciate Criticism, so no… Thank you Willis.
🙂
Regarding the data shown in slide 21 from the above link repeated here:
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=6&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CFkQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmason.gmu.edu%2F~bklinger%2FCLIM690%2Flec9_paleo.pdf&ei=IgiGU6yHOI2qyAS0zYGwCw&usg=AFQjCNEIE7pWV12ImGlxV-DwhRzT_OGKyQ&sig2=3CjXFeIRmQ9wEgToEq9iDw
The following link is a short description of how Earth’s wobble changes insolation over many 1000’s of years. This would be in addition to changes due to Earth’s electromagnetic field changes. All of these issues are intrinsic Earth variables that can produce long term trends in solar insolation (radiation at the surface of the Earth). And the mechanics have been figured out. Leif would be the superior source here to tell us which of these variables have the power to create C14 trends in paleo-length proxies. Maybe all of them do. My understanding is that beyond the regular 11-yr cycle affect, the above group of intrinsic sources would be the variables driving paleo-length C14 trends.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/ctl/clisci100ka.html
My final take: I don’t think it is clear from the article Shawnhet has been referring to that the authors ascribed C14 proxies for solar insolation to be driven by solar variation. They may have assumed the reader would understand the generally accepted source of that C14 variation to be intrinsic.
Pamela Gray says:
May 28, 2014 at 7:37 pm
Solar “insolation” is a strange word to use, what do you mean?
[See below. .mod]
I’m very surprised you asked, but I appreciate you be brave enough to recognize those times when you don’t recognize a phrase.
Solar Insolation” is a measure of how much solar energy is being deposited on a surface at a specific time of day and day-of-year at a specific latitude and cloud cover/dust/humidity/air condition.
Now, look at each of those conditions very, very carefully!
Solar insolation is in watts/m^2 usually, but you MUST be specific about each condition.
On a flat horizon surface?
On a flat surface, but one angled perpendicular at the sun?
On a flat surface, but on a vertical wall?
On that same vertical wall, but a few hours later in the day?
On a sloped roof, but measured in March?
On the same roof, but measured in mid-July or mid-December?
Above the atmosphere?
if so, at what day of year?
Use Insolation Top-Of-Atmosphere = =TSI*(1+0.0342*(COS(2*3.141*((DOY-3)/365))))
where TSI = 1361 (this year, it is the yearly “average” value
and DOY = day-of-year (remember leap year if you want to be precise!)
(above formula for those processors like Excel which use radians!!!)
Top of Atmosphere Insolation is highest on January 3 at 1410 watts/m^2
It is lowest at 1307 watts/m^2 about July 5 at 1307 watts/m^2
I have a spreadsheet for solar insolation at any specific latitude, any day of year, every hour of day available if you want it.
It has a second section giving the insolation at every latitude on a chosen day-of-year and hour-of-day. That section also has the solar radiation falling on the edge of the Arctic and Antarctic sea ice for that day-of-year as well.
RACookPE1978 says:
May 28, 2014 at 8:19 pm
Is that so?
RACookPE1978 says:
May 28, 2014 at 8:19 pm
Top of Atmosphere Insolation is highest on January 3 at 1410 watts/m^2
It is lowest at 1307 watts/m^2 about July 5 at 1307 watts/m^2
Are you attributing 103 watts/m^2 to seasonal variation?
Pamela,
Look at Willis plot, you see the powerful enso cycle,and you see the much weaker 11 year cycle sumper imposed on the side lobes of the Enso cycles, and at you see Watts often tauted double peak at 5+ years, I can see the cycles, the ratio between the power of each of those cycles can tell you about feedbacks And perhaps get some 3D dimensional variant feedback coefficients, that could help the computer models. If the cycles can be measured in the RSS or UAH the computer models can modified to vary the feedbacks with spherical model on a 1 day model.With 30 days of data you can make an accurate 15 year projection if their is a solar connection.
Its coming, don’t you want to know how bad its going to get?
milodonharlani says:
May 28, 2014 at 4:11 pm
“a MUCH larger modulation is due to variations in the Earth’s magnetic field”
How about a correlation probably without any causation?
No. The physics is well-understood and we can calculate in detail the variation of cosmic rays as a function of location on the Earth and of time given the variation of the Earth’s magnetic field. The latter may not always be well known, but the uncertainty is in the field, not in the response of the cosmic rays.
It is well known (to some) that sunspot activities and solar flares have some effect on Earth’s weather. They tend to deflect cosmic subatomic particles from Earth, where they can meld with subatomic water molecules and form clouds. Personally this thread is getting a boring. Thanks Willis for bringing this to our attention anyway. Volcano eruptions can produce dust and gases that will hide the sun and therefore cool the surface for a few years. And we cannot control any of this.
O/T Talking about cosmic rays, I have been diagnosed with ET, and researching it is thought cosmic rays (radiation) can cause this too. Don’t know how many of us are prone to leukaemia and the like from this. Interestingly, people who live on high altitudes seem to be more prone, and if they go and live at sea level, platelets return to normal?
It depends on how you view things. That day-to-day change is top-of-atmosphere solar radiation is simply what happens based on the earth’s ever-changign distance from the sun. That changing radiation hits every square meter of the earth’s surface.
BUT .. How the ground and water and oceans are AFFECTED by that changing solar radiation in January, February, March, July, September, October or December DOES vary as the earth’s declination changes each day. So, in the northern hemisphere in early July, we are receiving 103 watts/m^2 less solar radiation each second than in January, but the earth is tilted towards the sun and so – AT A SPECIFIC LATITUDE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE ATMOSPHERE we get a seasonal change in radiation as well. July – on a given square meter of ground – gets more radiation than it does in December.
At the edge of the Antarctic sea ice in September, each meter of ice receives 5 times as much solar radiation than does a square meter of sea ice up in the Arctic. At the top of atmosphere, both would get the same radiation.
I’m sorry for your diagnosis – And hope, you (like my sister – who has been at sea level her entire life!) both can continue longer fruitful years. My prayers and wishes!
To your question:
Yes. Cosmic rays are much more dangerous at high altitudes than at sea level because of the shielding effect of the air above the person 3600x24x7x52 … In the US naval nuclear program, those of us who were monitored continuously for radiation who worked up high (away from the reactor but closest to the “fresh air” and cosmic rays), got more radiation every year than those below the shielding of steel and water. Airline pilots and attendants get far more radiation than is allowed by the NRC for nuclear plant operators.
Pamela Gray says:
May 28, 2014 at 7:37 pm
“All of these issues are intrinsic Earth variables that can produce long term trends in solar insolation (radiation at the surface of the Earth). And the mechanics have been figured out. Leif would be the superior source here to tell us which of these variables have the power to create C14 trends in paleo-length proxies. Maybe all of them do. My understanding is that beyond the regular 11-yr cycle affect, the above group of intrinsic sources would be the variables driving paleo-length C14 trends.”
I’m sorry, Pam but you are still massively confused. Changes in insolation on their own (for instance due to the wobbles in the Earth’s orbit) have precisely **no** ability to affect the formation of C14 in the atmosphere. They are different processes entirely. Formation of C14 is affected by the amount of cosmic rays striking the atmosphere, and the magnetic field of the sun and the Earth.
In order to get to the idea that the changes in C14 are indicative of changes on the surface of the Earth only – you are going to have to propose an all new hypothesis of how the Earth’s magnetic field changes. Fine with me if you can do it but you should not get into the habit of claiming that other papers agree with you when they don’t. The generally accepted source of C14 variation simply cannot be the processes you claim to have caused it.
http://xkcd.com/radiation/
Look through this chart for a very clear demonstration of the various doses:
One banana.
One day at high altitude, compared to 4 or 5 hours on one long distance flight ….
A chest X-ray compared to a mammogram!
See the nuclear worker limit? The regulators “allow” that much “legally” by procedurally? You get fines and retaliation if anybody gets even 1/10 of that much.
Sparks says:
May 28, 2014 at 7:12 pm
Thanks for that, Sparks. That makes everything plain.
No answer to this question of mine? It’s the most important question … and the answer is, p-value of 0.08 (adjusted for autocorrelation). In other words, not statistically significant.
I’m sorry, I was not clear. My point is that when you look at 12 different starting months and up to 4 months lag, that’s 48 different combinations. With that many trials, you are almost guaranteed to get something which is apparently significant at a p-value of 0.05 …
In fact, for something to be significant at the p-value of 0.05, with 48 trials, you need to find something which individually is significant at a p-value that is approximately 0.05 / 48 ≈ 0.001 … and you are very, very far from that.
Sparks, I’m afraid I don’t understand that. Who is a “statistical sequencer”, and why would they assume that their functions are correct??
With a p-value of 0.08, and 48 trials (12 months and 4 lags to choose from) for each of the stations that you investigate, I fear that your graph doesn’t show much at all …
w.
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 28, 2014 at 10:56 pm
“I fear that your graph doesn’t show much at all …”
Reproduce it and show me the p-value.
bushbunny says:
May 28, 2014 at 10:05 pm
… Personally this thread is getting a boring. …
——
Nothing could be further from the truth…what an interesting and challenging post by Willis and the fascinating discussion it has generated. We’re all learning things here and that Watts it is all about! Keep the comments coming!
Sparks says:
May 28, 2014 at 11:38 pm (Edit)
Oh, my goodness. I’ve given you a host of things to think about, chief among them the fact that finding a p-value less than 0.05 is almost guaranteed when you look at up to 48 tests for each station, and that with that many trials you need to find a p-value less than 0.001 … and that’s your answer? How about you worry about the important stuff?
The graph is immaterial. As for the p-value, you have to adjust for autocorrelation. I use the method of Quenouille, viz:
But your real problem is that you haven’t adjusted the significance level to account for your large number of trials …
w.
Willis,
I see… you have the wrong idea of what my graph is about, you should reproduce it first. waffling about statistics isn’t going to reproduce the graph.
RACookPE1978 see the level of radiation 02.25.2014.
http://oi60.tinypic.com/33o7hax.jpg
Shawnhet, the paper you refer to specifically uses solar insolation (solar radiation: IE the entire spectrum of solar radiation hitting the surface of the Earth) in its metrics. I have adequately pointed out the variables that affect solar insolation. You contend that they use C14 as a proxy for solar insolation. Now that you know solar insolation varies more significantly from intrinsic variables than it does from the solar variable (IE 11 yr cycle), what say you as to the conclusions of the paper? If indeed they use C14 as their proxy to tell us how solar insulation varied as a function of some kind of significant solar metric outside of its 11 yr cycle, I would be skeptical in light of how the Earth is a far stronger source of solar insolation variation. You are not?
Pamela Gray says:
May 29, 2014 at 5:49 am
Pamela, you just aren’t getting it. No one is disputing that insolation can vary quite a bit due to the intrinsic factors you mention. You are claiming however that variations in the sun cannot account for any significant climate changes. I give you a reference that shows how the C14 levels closely track long term climate changes. You have no response to this except to propose an apparently unphysical connection between C14 and *”intrinsic” insolation*. The common, mainstream explanation for this is that the changes in C14 follow solar changes (and the extrinsic component of insolation). You cannot explain the relationship that the Neff paper discovered and you cannot claim that the Neff paper agrees with you. It does not.
Shawnhet says:
May 29, 2014 at 8:11 am
I give you a reference that shows how the C14 levels closely track long term climate changes.
That claim does not hold much water. Check slide 20 of http://www.leif.org/research/Does%20The%20Sun%20Vary%20Enough.pdf
If we are still looking here’s another:
Interactions between externally forced climate signals from sunspot peaks and the internally generated Pacific Decadal and North Atlantic Oscillations
Loon & Meehl 2014
When the Pacific Decadal Oscillation is in phase with the 11 year sunspot cycle, there are positive sea level pressure (SLP) anomalies in the Gulf of Alaska, nearly no anomalous zonal SLP gradient across the equatorial Pacific, and a mix of small positive and negative sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies there. When the two indices are out of phase, positive SLP anomalies extend farther south in the Gulf of Alaska and west into eastern Russia, with a strengthened anomalous zonal equatorial Pacific SLP gradient and larger magnitude and more extensive negative SST anomalies along the equatorial Pacific. In the North Atlantic, when the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) is in phase with the sunspot peaks, there is an intensified positive NAO SLP pattern. When the NAO is out of phase with the peaks, there is the opposite pattern (negative NAO). The relationships are physically consistent with previously identified processes and mechanisms and point the way to further research.
lsvalgaard says:
May 29, 2014 at 8:16 am
Check out Figure 4 of: “Holocene Forcing of the Indian Monsoon Recorded in a Stalagmite from Southern Oman”
Cheers, 🙂
Shawnhet says:
May 29, 2014 at 9:12 am
Check out Figure 4 of: “Holocene Forcing of the Indian Monsoon Recorded in a Stalagmite from Southern Oman”
1st: that is not global
2nd: dating and temperature proxies are uncertain
3rd: the gullible will believe anything.
lsvalgaard says:
May 29, 2014 at 9:40 am
1st: It refers to one of the most important features of global circulation patterns,
2nd: And the paper deals with how to analyze these uncertain records
3rd: No one has to believe anything. If you have a better interpretation, go ahead and publish it. Until you do, I’ll stick with the published stuff.
Willis Eschenbach says:
May 27, 2014 at 1:54 pm
Greg, after work last night I took a closer look at this. You plot the “first difference” of the Tahiti sea level pressure, d(SLP)/dt, and you get this.
I’ve tried the same thing, and I get this:
You sure that you are plotting the derivative d(SLP)/dt? I get nothing like what you get. I also don’t get your result for the cross-correlation of the sunspot number (SSN) with d(SSN).
I’m in mystery here …
w.
PS—Since correlation goes from -1 to 1, plotting on any other scale to make your results look more significant is heinous chartsmanship …
Shawnhet says:
May 29, 2014 at 9:48 am
I’ll stick with the published stuff.
Here is some published stuff: http://www.leif.org/EOS/Is-there-Evidence-for-Solar-Forcing.pdf
“Numerous authors have considered the apparently self-evident hypothesis that since the sun is the fundamental driving force for the earth’s climate, there should be clear links between the main climate patterns and the main index of solar variability. However, rigorous testing of causative links between sunspots and climate indices finds no links on time scales up to about 15 years. Solar driving of climate must be present at timescales relevant to glacial-interglacial cycles and most-likely at shorter scales as well, but solar and climate proxies that meet length and resolution criteria necessary to prove the hypothesis are yet to be adequately tested.”
Regardless of such lack of evidence, solar enthusiasts continue to believe in their conviction, you are seemingly no different.
You gotta love it….Little Ice Age…The Big chill is on H2 (History Channel #2) just watched them say “There is questions as to what caused the start of the LIA ,BUT, there is little doubt what caused the coldest period…the Maunder Minimum, less sunspots, less solar radiation,and global cooling because of…THE SUN !!! ” Several scientist stand up on TV and confirm this! So, the ‘science is not settled’. Not saying they are right, just pointing out this is no different than saying man is responsible for GW. No one really knows for sure … YET…except that man is not responsible for GW, and soon, we will know what causes GW and GC.
From lsvalgaard on May 29, 2014 at 12:10 pm:
Be glad they aren’t explaining how the sunspot cycle is masked from the data due to the added variations from the epicycles. And how as Mars is not yet ascendant over Jupiter while Venus is in retrograde this shall bring peace to Syria while granting you increased virility.
Leif,
If you want to say I am gullible for believing a particular paper, you may want to provide evidence that that paper is somehow flawed. You would not want to provide evidence relating only to yearly and decadal trends and completely ignore the idea that the dynamics may be different and/or easier to see over longer timeframes.
On it’s face, the paper I provided is evidence of a solar effect and you have provided no plausible argument against its conclusions. Maybe you have one, but just because some other guys didn’t find a relationship looking at different data over the short term doesn’t mean that there is anything wrong with the paper I referenced.
Shawnhet says:
May 29, 2014 at 12:50 pm
On it’s face, the paper I provided is evidence of a solar effect and you have provided no plausible argument against its conclusions.
There are hundreds of such papers, all with their own flaws. One believes what fits one’s world-view or agenda. The published paper I provided argues that there is no strong evidence for solar forcing [as Willis also found]. Show where it goes wrong. My point is that just because a paper is ‘published’ does not lend it automatic credence [as you seem to imply].
lsvalgaard says:
May 29, 2014 at 12:55 pm
I already showed you were it is less that ideal. Your paper deals with too short a timeframe to plausibly address all the effects that can affect the climate. How long does it take for the oceans to equilibrate to a change in forcing? A lot more than 15 years that’s for sure.
It is entirely possible that there is nothing wrong with the paper you reference *and* that there is nothing wrong with the paper *I* reference. It is entirely possible (and frankly plausible) for us to be unable to detect short term changes caused by the sun but not if those effects persist for longer time periods. In that context, do you have any substantive critique of my paper?
I am honestly interested but to me it appears that you simply reflexively dismissed my paper without even reading it.
lsvalgaard says:
May 28, 2014 at 9:53 pm
I was referring, apparently too obscurely, to the seeming correspondence or lack thereof between climatic phenomena & changes in geomagnetism.
Well I wish someone had told me that any paper showing a solar cycle influence must be flawed before I started digging through my references. On a positive note it did let me find several dead links and forced me to do a little organizing so it wasn’t a complete waste of time.
LT says:
May 27, 2014 at 1:25 pm
LT says:
May 28, 2014 at 1:31 pm
Actually, LT, the 11-12 year peak is the fifth strongest peak. In order they are 7.8, 2.4, 1.6, 2.9, and 11.3 years.
Next, as I pointed out in my RSS analysis, we have only 32 years of data for the datasets you’ve chosen. That means we can’t even diagnose a 12-year cycle. I mean you can plot it, but you’re getting into the very sketchy realm. I doubt very much if the 11-year cycle is statistically significant.
Finally, you’ve shown no evidence of a “5 – 9 [year] ENSO” cycle, and I have no idea if there is one. I’ve never looked at the periodogram of the El Nino. Hang on … OK, here’s the periodogram of the Oceanic Nino Index (ONI):
As you can see, while there is a 3.75 and a 5 year cycle, there is no “5 – 9” year cycle. As a result, your explanation of the 7.8 year peak fails completely.
w.
From Dominic Manginell on May 29, 2014 at 12:15 pm:
Really? Wikipedia says about the LIA:
Down in the Causes: Solar Activity section it says:
So by the NASA definition of the period, it would be the Spörer Minimum that ushered in the LIA, which correlates with other definitions of the period.
As seen by the table and chart at link, the Spörer Minimum had a very wide trough, at 90 years overall. The Maunder Minimum in contrast was a ramp down and ramp up without significant dwelling at the bottom, and only 70 years total.
So Spörer starts the LIA, then Maunder lines up with the start of first particularly cold interval.
But then the short Dalton Minimum runs from 1790 to 1830, thus it didn’t even start until twenty years into the second particularly cold interval.
And the last particularly cold interval started twenty years after the end of the Dalton Minimum, thus the planet was getting colder despite the solar activity ramping up.
Thus the evidence shows solar influence is likely not the primary driver of these climate changes, but may have a contributory factor. Indeed, there are several candidates for being contributory factors. Further research is indicated.
And your fixation on the best-known Maunder Minimum is unseemly and unbecoming of an inquisitive mind, no further research indicated.
LT says:
May 28, 2014 at 3:25 pm
LT,
You should at least quote my words before accusing me of “dismissing evidence”.
QUOTE! MY! WORDS! THAT! YOU! DISAGREE WITH! I have never made the claim that “the Sunspot Cycle is the biggest cycle”.
Not according to those who say “It’s the sun, stupid!”
Ooooh, fatal mistake, LT. When a man starts telling me he’s right because of his extensive experience, I know I’ve won the debate …
Your claim that I “only discovered the FFT less than 60 days ago” is a pathetic attempt to deflect attention from the science.
More to the point, your claim is absolute BS. Here is a post of my from 2011 discussing the brilliant insights of old Joe Fourier, which were way old news to me then … sixty days, my aspidistras.
But that means nothing about my analysis—either it’s right, or it’s wrong. And not only is when I “discovered” Joe Fourier meaningless, I first started learning about Fourier in the 1970’s … so I’ll see your thirty years, and raise you to forty years. However, my forty and your thirty mean absolutely nothing here. Either our claims are right or they are not. For example, your claim that the 7.75 year peak in the RSS results is due to the El Nino periodicity is totally contradicted by the data … and all of your thirty years and my forty years makes no difference in the slightest to that fact.
I agree with you completely when you say “33 years of data is more than enough data for an 11 year cycle to show up on a power spectrum”.
But the question isn’t whether it shows up, lots of things “show up” … the question is whether we can trust it, whether it means anything or whether it is just part of the random fluctuations. My experience in climate science has shown me that three cycles is an absolute minimum, and even then you can get badly fooled. I’ve shown elsewhere that there are strong cycles in some climate datasets that last for a century or more, five or six cycles … and then just disappear for the next century. Go figure …
Regards,
w.
“There is only one CERTAINTY….NOTHING is Certain !” I am humbled by and admire all here. I see much hard work and dedication going on and we here that read this site are much better ‘educated’ cause of you ….Thank you!
steven says:
May 27, 2014 at 7:12 pm
Thanks, steven, but that study is paywalled. Dig up a copy and I’ll take a look, I’m not paying for unknown studies.
w.
PS—I note that they have looked at three geographical areas and lags up to 3 years, which means their results need to be significant at the p-value of 0.01 … and I strongly doubt they are. Looks like a data dredge to me …
steven says:
May 28, 2014 at 12:02 pm
Thanks, Steven. Any study that claims to be using “reanalysis data” should be looked at very, very carefully. “Reanalysis data” is climatespeak for “computer model results”. As such, you need to think about several things you wouldn’t need to think about if it were actually observations. Inter alia, these are:
1. How good is the model?
2. What model results are of interest (surface temps, atmospheric temps, pressures, etc.)?
3. What data is input to the model, in order to produce the results?
4. How much of the result you’re interested in is observation, and how much is imagination?
What a global reanalysis model does is to use the observations as constraints, and then figure out the unknown values (e.g. in gridcells where there are no observations) using all the information that we have.
And therein lies a big problem problem for this particular study. You see, one of the things that the reanalysis models use as input is solar energy … so we are virtually guaranteed to find “solar influence” in the model outputs for gridcells with no observations. Remember that computer climate models are linear machines—their output is a simple lagged linear transformation of their input. So if they put solar in, they’ll get solar out.
The problem is compounded by choosing tropospheric temperatures, in that we have very little balloon data for temperatures over the oceans (and not a whole lot over the land). This means that pre-satellite, the model is making up 70% of the data or more …
Since when you put solar in you get solar out, we should not be surprised when Zhou and Tung find it. We should also not assume that has anything to do with the real world.
w.
Shawnhet says:
May 29, 2014 at 9:48 am
I’ll stick with the published stuff.
lsvalgaard says:
Here is some published stuff: http://www.leif.org/EOS/Is-there-Evidence-for-Solar-Forcing.pdf
interesting paper – i downloaded the pdf for further study – but clarify something for me – are they saying that they’ve proven a negative – something Willis has specifically denied doing
steven says:
May 29, 2014 at 8:39 am
“Another”? I haven’t seen the first one yet that actually shows a solar connection. I know there are lots of studies out there, but each one I look at evaporates … in any case, you go on to reference:
LINKS! PROVIDE LINKS! There’s not enough hours in the day for me to screw around with a string of bad studies. You want an answer, you provide the link.
w.
From Willis Eschenbach on May 29, 2014 at 2:33 pm:
Google-Fu applied:
Ms. Prof. Lesley Gray – much research connecting solar variability to climate responses
https://www2.physics.ox.ac.uk/contacts/people/grayl
Email link there. Request a copy?
However at the Wiley link it says:
Submitted, revised, published… and corrected five months later, over a year after first submission?
What value is a copy, especially a preprint, without knowing the correction?
Hey I might have some meat on a 2013 co-authored paper, GRL:
A mechanism for lagged North Atlantic climate response to solar variability.
Oh, it’s a model that fits output from climate models.
Just as well. This was given up by Google Scholar as the only available free download link. After a browser download fail, wget (which ABC news said is a powerful hacking tool favored by Snowden) has spent about 10 minutes continually retrying before finally surrendering, always saying “Read error at byte 90319/630864”.
Can hackers be putting out “free download” doctored PDF’s to ensnare all those rich but miserly scholars and scientists?
Willis, I don’t want an answer. I thought you did. I’m an ocean heat transport skeptic and it matters not the least to me if it is forced or just internal variation. If you were really looking for an answer you would have already found everything I linked. Google is your friend.
Regarding vanLoon and Meehl (2014) :
It is shown solar peak years as used by vanLoon and Meehl are associated with cold events of ENSO. Thus the composite study in this paper seems to me is nothing but ENSO -ve and PDO +ve for Fig 1e; whereas ENSO -ve and PDO -ve for Fig 1f. Hence for obvious reason there is no SST signature in tropics for 1e (cancelling each other) and very strong -ve SST in tropics for 1f (reinforce each other). Such observation can simply be attributed to cold ENSO rather than peak sun.
Regarding Fig 2: During cold ENSO, as we know more undisturbed polar vortex and hence more +ve NAO. Thus peak sun (cold ENSO phase) and +NAO will imply more positive NAO (hence more std dev). Whereas peak sun (cold ENSO which also imply more +ve NAO) and negative NAO will obviously reduce negative NAO (hence more std deviation).
Regarding Gray et al. (2014):
In the observation if different period is chosen the lag response is different. How can any mechanism related to sun can explain that ?
Willis, I have to say when I saw the results of you spectral analysis of the RSS and I saw the small peak near the 11 year cycle, I found it to be very intriguing and not easily dissmissed as noise, do you not think that is a possible signature of the 11 year cycle in the RSS data?
Willis,
What do you suppose the cycle on the follwing graph is caused by?
http://i1240.photobucket.com/albums/gg484/ltwells3/NINO_zps5e25f9aa.png
Shawnhet says:
May 29, 2014 at 1:13 pm
I am honestly interested but to me it appears that you simply reflexively dismissed my paper without even reading it.
That paper is old hat and I have read it long ago. It is not convincing. One typical problem is that it only talks about a piece of the whole time series.
lsvalgaard the sun will not listen. Yours.
http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/hmi_igr/1024/latest.html
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/webform/query.cgi?startday=01&startmonth=01&startyear=2003&starttime=00%3A00&endday=31&endmonth=12&endyear=2012&endtime=00%3A00&resolution=Automatic+choice&picture=on
Sorry.
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/webform/query.cgi?startday=01&startmonth=01&startyear=2003&starttime=00%3A00&endday=31&endmonth=05&endyear=2014&endtime=00%3A00&resolution=Automatic+choice&picture=on
lsvalgaard says:
May 29, 2014 at 9:45 pm
“That paper is old hat and I have read it long ago. It is not convincing. One typical problem is that it only talks about a piece of the whole time series.”
I presume that you are talking about the following issue(from the paper): “Fourth, stalagmite deposition stopped at 2.7 ky B.P. and restarted from between 1.4 and 0.4 ky B.P. The 18O values of the second growth phase lie within the range of modern stalagmites (Fig. 1).” If that is the case, it seems a little extreme to throw out the entire set of records derived from the stalagmite because a portion is missing. Clearly, the records were not omitted as cherry picking or whatever.
kadaka….may 29 2:22pm….I was just quoting what was being said ‘by scientist’ on this particular program and if you would have read on you would have seen that I say I do not necessarily agree with them…The point I am trying to make is there are hundreds of ‘peer reviewed papers’ out there that say it is the sun,the planets,cosmic rays,CO2, ect ect. and so on and so on….it’s never ending !! And I’m right…no,I’m right…no, he/she’s wrong and waving arms in air and pointing (my mother says that’s rude!)…and like I state later on…”There is only one certainty….nothing is certain!”
Shawnhet says:
May 30, 2014 at 8:15 am
Clearly, the records were not omitted as cherry picking or whatever.
Your faith is touching, but not convincing.
kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
May 29, 2014 at 2:22 pm
Maybe just coincidence, but the trough of the Wolf Minimum corresponds with the Great Famine of 1315. Clearly, the MWP was becoming unstable towards its end, with a brief rewarming in the late 14th century before descent into the LIA, the onset of which IMO you correctly associate with the Spoerer Minimum.
You shouldn’t need anymore evidence than this
http://i1240.photobucket.com/albums/gg484/ltwells3/NINO_zps5e25f9aa.png
lsvalgaard says:
May 30, 2014 at 10:48 am
“Clearly, the records were not omitted as cherry picking or whatever. Your faith is touching, but not convincing.”
Well, I suppose I do have faith that people tell the truth until I have evidence that they don’t. The fact that you don’t apparently doesn’t convince me that you have any valid objection to the paper. If the fact that someone *may* be lying is an argument against a paper, there is no reason for the paper you posted earlier to be convincing either.
LT said on May 30, 2014 at 12:24 pm:
I’m convinced. You’re a plagiarist. Your image does not note the source image as from Willis. Also while Willis’ original does not list him by name in the image info, it does have the comment “AppleMark” and a long hexadecimal “signature” that may be traceable to him. This is stripped from your version, which yields “Adobe Photoshop CS2 Windows” and has another signature.
You’re also a disk space and bandwidth hogger. The original is a sparse 37.8KB, your bastardization is bloated out to 200.6KB.
Why couldn’t you simply link to his comment or to the image itself, and simply ask him “What does that 12 year peak mean?”
Instead you have the defiled evidence of your unconscionable thievery posted to your freebie Photobucket account, stripped of all provenance, completely lacking even the smallest of notations to recognize the hard effort of he who toiled to painstakingly produce and publish, that which you have brazenly stolen.
You sicken me.
Shawnhet says:
May 30, 2014 at 1:26 pm
Well, I suppose I do have faith that people tell the truth until I have evidence that they don’t. The fact that you don’t apparently doesn’t convince me that you have any valid objection to the paper.
This has nothing to do with telling the truth. My valid objection to the paper is that it mainly is about insolation changes and a non-objectionable connection between temperature and monsoons. Then there is a small residual decadal variation that may or may not be correlated with 14C.Their Figure 14 is marginal and could easily be a chance coincidence with only a fifth of the variation ‘explained’ by 14C [which in turn is only loosely correlated with solar activity]. Not to speak about the wiggle-matching needed to overcome the uncertainty in dating. The paper I cited took reliable data for the last 100 years and finds [as Willis] no observable correlation with solar activity on decadal time scales.
There are hundreds of papers claiming solar activity connections. If all of these hundreds of paper would agree to the level of correlation, to the timing and amplitudes, and perhaps have a valid physical cause for the claimed connection then we would have a solid scientific basis for the contention that solar activity is an important factor in climate variation, but none of that is there, so the subject remains contentious. fuzzy, and of little use in practical predictions.
O/T Volcanic eruption in Indonesia has caused aircraft to cancel flights. Heading for Northern Australia, Brisbane and Sydney. Lets see if that alters the weather, eh?
[Yeppers. For an On-Topic thread, see
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/05/30/large-volcanic-eruption-in-indonesia-this-years-excuse-for-the-pause/ .mod]
lsvalgaard says:
May 30, 2014 at 6:27 pm
Couldn’t agree more, Leif. My problem all along has been that yes, there are plenty of hints and intimations that the sun is slightly involved in climate over here, and peripherally connected over there.
But if there were any clear, convincing evidence, we’d have been done with the question long ago. People have been looking for said connection literally for centuries … but where is the evidence?
People in this thread have brought in what they say is evidence … but upon closer examination, it seems to evaporate, and we are left with little but hints, with occasions correlations that appear and disappear like the Cheshire cat, with models all the way down, with relationships so weak that they need three statisticians and a bulldozer to pull them out of the data.
Nowhere is there anything clear, anything convincing. It’s all way, way down in the weeds … and remember, this is after a couple of centuries, not decades but centuries, of searching.
Now, as I said above, I hold that this is merely another consequence of the fact that the global temperature is NOT a linear function of the forcing as the standard climate paradigm claims. Instead, it is thermally regulated by emergent phenomena, and is remarkably resistant to changes in forcing, whether solar or other.
Note that I am not (as Mosher thought) offering this up as any kind of proof of my hypothesis about emergent phenomena. Absence of evidence is the weakest kind of evidence. I am merely saying that I think the results support my hypothesis, and do not support the conventional hypothesis—if the system were as exquisitely tied to forcing as the conventional paradigm claims, we’d see detectable variations in the temperature from all kinds of things, from the 11-year solar changes, from the volcanoes, from CO2.
But we don’t see those variations, which was the point of this post …
w.
lsvalgaard says:
May 30, 2014 at 6:27 pm
Well, I wish that you would’ve started with this sort of post instead of starting off by saying that folks who disagree with you must be gullible or whatever. It may surprise you to hear that I don’t disagree with all that much in this post, we just have different interpretations. I will address a couple of the most important points.
1st basic issue – proxies are somewhat uncertain (wiggle fitting etc…) this is true but if we want to know anything about long term climate we are forced to use them. Our alternative is just to look at long term climate changes and just say “I don’t know”. There are reasonably well established techniques to deal with this uncertainty IMO.
2nd basic issue – solar effects can only explain a portion of the variation in climate – this is true but I do not agree that the correlation could just as easily be by chance. From the paper: “Results of spectral analysis of both the detrended raw data and finetuned data further reinforce our interpretation that second-order variations in IOM precipitation were triggered by changes in solar activity” At the end of the day, though, climate is complex, people who are expecting a single factor to fully correlate with climate will continue to be disappointed IMO. We don’t rule out CO2 as largely causing the recent temperature changes even though its recent correlation is no better than the amount found here.
Cheers, 🙂
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 10:59 am
Well, I wish that you would’ve started with this sort of post instead of starting off by saying that folks who disagree with you must be gullible or whatever.
You are too willing to believe flimsy ‘evidence’ and to appeal to the weight that a ‘published’ paper is supposed to have. I feel a certain [unwarranted] arrogance in your responses to Pamela.
Now, if the stalagmites carry solid evidence of solar activity influence that would be of overwhelming importance. A standard measure of scientific ‘solidity’ is the notion of ‘repeatability’: If you have several records from different stalagmites and the agree in showing a signature of solar activity, then the claim is strengthened immensely. But in a follow-up paper in 2007 by the same authors reporting on the analysis of the stalagmite records from four caves in Oman and Yemen http://www.leif.org/EOS/Holocene-ITCZ-Stalagmites.pdf there is no mention whatsoever of a solar activity or 14C signal. The obvious conclusion is that there is no mention because there is no such signal and that their earlier claim was a fluke. This happens so often in this business: a purported signal disappears when more data is examined. To solar enthusiasts that does not seem to matter. You should have looked further and found the 2007-paper yourself, but, no, you were all too willing to rely only on the 2003-paper. This is where the ‘gullibility’ [or worse] rears its ugly head.
Oh Willis, you certainly know how to provoke the disciples.
What on earth were you thinking? You know full well that provoking the Sun/CO2/extinction crew just forces all the nasties out of the wood work.
You have the patience of a saint. If this t**t had e-mailed that to me then I would have crossed the corridor and beaten the living s**t out of him.
Keep up the good work.
lsvalgaard says:
May 31, 2014 at 11:25 am
“But in a follow-up paper in 2007 by the same authors reporting on the analysis of the stalagmite records from four caves in Oman and Yemen http://www.leif.org/EOS/Holocene-ITCZ-Stalagmites.pdf there is no mention whatsoever of a solar activity or 14C signal.”
Thank you for the paper. Unfortunately, your statement about it is wrong. It does talk about solar influences multiple times for instance from the Conclusion:
“From 7.8 ka BP to present the mean summer ITCZ continuously migrated southward and ISM intensity and precipitation decreased gradually in response to solar insolation”
There are other multiple uses repetitions of demontrating the solar-climate link using stalagmites if you are interested (here are 3 of them)”
The Holocene Asian Monsoon: Links to Solar Changes and North Atlantic Climate
Late Holocene annual growth in three Alpine stalagmites records the influence of solar activity and the North Atlantic Oscillation on winter climate
Solar forcing of Holocene climate: New insights from a speleothem record, southwestern United States
Respectfully, there may be many problems with my position but being based on non-repeatable science is not one of them ;).
Cheers, 🙂
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 4:28 pm
Thank you for the paper. Unfortunately, your statement about it is wrong. It does talk about solar influences multiple times
It talks about solar insolation due to orbital changes, not to solar activity. This is a good example of your gullibility that you get confused about this.
lsvalgaard says:
May 31, 2014 at 4:37 pm
Ok, I’ll eat some crow on this one, Sorry. I did not understand the point you were making. Frankly, I get a bit mad when you start accusing me of being gullible or arrogant.
I stand by my three additional references as proof of repeatability. Just because a paper doesn’t mention a C14 correlation does not mean that they have found anything wrong with the papers that found such a connection. As far as I can tell, they never even looked at the C14 connection one way or another. I do not assume that they looked for it and couldn’t find it just because they don’t mention it.
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 5:10 pm
I stand by my three additional references as proof of repeatability.
You didn’t give any references, and your hints do not show repeatability of the effect, just repetitive gullibility.
Just because a paper doesn’t mention a C14 correlation does not mean that they have found anything wrong with the papers that found such a connection.
There is nothing ‘wrong’ with their first paper on this. The same authors did not repeat the claim when looking at more examples. This is good evidence that they didn’t find any signal. Since proving a real solar activity relation would be much more important than just the non-contentious solar insolation connection, I’m sure the authors would have mention it if there had been a clear signal. That they don’t simply shows that there is nothing to report and an admission that their earlier claim was spurious.
Dredging up more examples of shaky correlations does not help. I can show you hundreds of peer-reviewed, published papers that claim a solar activity connection. None of them is conclusive or compelling [otherwise the case would long have been settled and there would be no ‘debate’]
lsvalgaard says:
May 31, 2014 at 5:23 pm
“There is nothing ‘wrong’ with their first paper on this. The same authors did not repeat the claim when looking at more examples. This is good evidence that they didn’t find any signal.”
I wouldn’t be so sure of this. Fleitmann, at least, still stands behind the C14 connection as evidenced by the SOLAR INFLUENCES ON CLIMATE (2010) paper of which he was a co author.
“Dredging up more examples of shaky correlations does not help”
Statistically speaking, it must help. Lot’s of independent confirmation of solar changes accounting for a small amount of climate variation is pretty good evidence that something is going on IMO. Isn’t that exactly what we would expect if we allow that climate is a pretty complex phenomenon? It’s not as though we have any other perfectly complete theory sitting on the shelf anywhere that explains everything that people are just ignoring.
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 5:50 pm
I wouldn’t be so sure of this. Fleitmann, at least, still stands behind the C14 connection as evidenced by the SOLAR INFLUENCES ON CLIMATE (2010) paper of which he was a co author.
But you seem sure of the opposite. And often, being a co-author does not mean complete agreement, but simply that he supplied data or input to the paper.
But, that paper is well-known, so one can check for oneself, The paper is actually rather critical of the solar connection, for example “for the latter part of the twentieth century they consistently find that using realistic variations, solar forcing played only a minor role in global warming, in agreement with the practically constant mean solar forcing since 1980”, and ends with “Further observations and research are required to improve our understanding of solar forcing mechanisms and their impacts on the Earth’s climate”, so the paper is very cautious in its claims.
lsvalgaard says:
May 31, 2014 at 6:10 pm
“But you seem sure of the opposite. And often, being a co-author does not mean complete agreement, but simply that he supplied data or input to the paper.”
Respectfully, you are the one that is arguing that the absence of a mention of the C14 connection is evidence that that connection cannot be replicated. I gave three other examples of substantive replication. All I know for sure about your paper is that it doesn’t say anything one another about the link I have been talking about.
I don’t really disagree with the balance of your post. I also think that recent solar influence on climate has been mild, at best.
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 5:50 pm
Lot’s of independent confirmation of solar changes accounting for a small amount of climate variation is pretty good evidence that something is going on IMO
There is no doubt that solar activity accounts for a small part of climate variability [of the order of 0.1 degree globally and possibly larger regionally], but that is not the real issue, which is whether solar activity plays a dominant or even significant role in climate variation. And there is no good evidence for that, so gullibility [or worse: agenda] becomes the usual measure as evidenced by your comments here.
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 6:29 pm
Respectfully, you are the one that is arguing that the absence of a mention of the C14 connection is evidence that that connection cannot be replicated. I gave three other examples of substantive replication.
since you did not link to them, you have given nothing.
“There is no doubt that solar activity accounts for a small part of climate variability [of the order of 0.1 degree globally and possibly larger regionally], but that is not the real issue, which is whether solar activity plays a dominant or even significant role in climate variation. And there is no good evidence for that, so gullibility [or worse: agenda] becomes the usual measure as evidenced by your comments here”
Ah, well maybe there is just some confusion about my actual position – I have never said that solar plays a dominant role in climate (I have often said there are many factors). I do believe it is somewhat significant though.
“since you did not link to them, you have given nothing.”
That’s quite disingenuous, frankly. Am I supposed to believe that using Google Scholar is beyond your capabilities? IAC, here are the links:
http://www.whoi.edu/science/GG/paleoseminar/pdf/wang05.pdf
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0012821X03005156
http://geology.gsapubs.org/content/35/1/1.short
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 6:51 pm
Am I supposed to believe that using Google Scholar is beyond your capabilities?
No, but since you are making the claim, the burden is on you.
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 6:51 pm
IAC, here are the links
As usual, when one actually checks the links the ‘repeatability’ disappears. Here is a comparison between one of your links and the 2003 Fleitmann paper:
http://www.leif.org/research/Stalagmites-and-14C.png
Apart from the spike at 6200 BP, there is little correspondence [repeatability] between the records. So we are back to gullibility and the willingness to believe.
lsvalgaard says:
May 31, 2014 at 7:19 pm
As usual, when one actually checks the links the ‘repeatability’ disappears.
And there is the usual confusion about units. The 18O scales seem to be reversed [plotted upside down]. And BTW Figure 19 in the 2010 Review has some problems too [check the three curves].
I’m sorry I can’t make any sense of your page – can you at least tell me what link you think you are comparing to the Fleitmann paper?
With 656 replies to Willis’ essay, what is our conclusion. The sun does effect the climate? (I hope so). Cosmic rays that hit earth create more clouds? Yes. Volcano eruptions if large enough of course and the type of volcanic eruption can cool the earth for a time. (Yes they can) Sea temps can be effected by volcanic eruptions (?) sea temps don’t vary much, unless you are in the tropics or if you swim in Bermuda (very warm). The Gulf Stream keeps North America and UK etc., from freezing. Yes. A warmer period precedes mini ice ages, or glacial periods? Yes it has been proven this has happened in the past. CO2 levels vary and have been higher than today. (Well cold temps don’t encourage plants or trees to grow).
Large cities are generally warmer and create a UHI effect, as wind is diverted around buildings, concrete and glass absorb heat, etc. Desert temps fluctuate during the night and day due to no cloud cover. Cities also create their own pollution. Weather patterns vary depending on where the country is, elevation and tree cover, etc. So – Mann is off his tree.
Sea levels do vary over centuries. Caused by land rising, land sinking, erosion, and the action of the moon on tides. Hmm, isn’t that sufficient to say, that cutting CO2 or methane will do nothing to cool the climate, as per IPCC predictions. Sorry to go on so long, and not give links or whatever.
Over the millennium we have gone from colder periods to hotter periods that do effect human occupation of certain areas around the globe. And we are in a nice interglacial that means, warmer temps suit us better than cold temperatures. Farmers have to adapt and they will.
The volcano in Indonesia is no longer effecting flights from Australia. Unless it blows again.And the bottom line, there is nothing we can do about any of these things, but adapt.
P.S. During a full eclipse of the sun, the temps drop 20 degrees, I suspect F.
Ok, looking at Leif’s diagram in more detail – I think that I can see what the potential issue is here. It looks like both the Fleitmann and Wang papers (that Leif seems to be comparing) use different techniques to detrend and tune the data. Again, we are looking at residuals to a trend. For myself, I can’t tell just by looking at the graphs whether they are consistent with one another or not.
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 7:42 pm
I’m sorry I can’t make any sense of your page
I presumed that you had actually read your own links. I compare with Figure 3 of
http://geology.gsapubs.org/content/35/1/1.full.pdf+html
For myself, I can’t tell just by looking at the graphs whether they are consistent with one another or not
Then how can you claim ‘repeatability’?
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 6:51 pm
Ah, well maybe there is just some confusion about my actual position
I personally don’t have a ‘position’. Having one smacks too much of having an agenda. I’m a scientist and go where the data leads without regards for any ‘position’.
lsvalgaard says:
May 31, 2014 at 8:33 pm
“I presumed that you had actually read your own links.”
I have read them. I was able to figure out which diagram you were looking at. I still don’t follow your exact point is though.
“Then how can you claim ‘repeatability’?”
??? They did very similar things and came up with similar conclusions. I don’t have access to their data so I am not able to redo their math. If there is a way to just look at the graphs and see that they are not compatible (even though they come up with similar conclusions), it escapes me. The only way I would be able to do that is by starting with the source data which I don’t have access to.
Shawnhet says:
May 31, 2014 at 10:09 pm
I have read them. I was able to figure out which diagram you were looking at. I still don’t follow your exact point is though.
The point is that the data is very noisy and that the graphs from the two papers are not very similar so one cannot be said to be supporting the other, thus no repeatability.
Kadaka,
My post here are between me and Willis, I found a correlation of a climate metric that has an 11.86 year cycle, the same as Jupiter and the same cycle as the Sunspot cycle and Willis dismissed and told me to show up to the debate with more than my Johnson, so there is Willis data that he dissmissed as inconclusive, there is solar signal. The debate is over.
It sickens me how little you add to this debate.
~LT
From LT June 1, 2014 at 10:04 pm:
Heh heh heh. You’re funny.
And an unapologetic plagiarist.
Here are the relevant quotes from the Lean and Rind article I referenced above, as well as Lean and Rind’s discussion of the Camp and Tung results I also referenced. Neither is a reanalysis.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/enhanced/doi/10.1029/2008GL034864/
“[11] Solar activity is reliably detected in the global historical surface temperature record, for example, producing a peak monthly increase of 0.17 ± 0.01 K from April 1996 (solar minimum) to February 2002 (solar maximum). The 13-month running mean solar cycle change is 0.11 K at one month lag, consistent with the solar cycle signal found in lower troposphere satellite data since 1979 [Douglass and Clader, 2002]. The response is strongest at mid latitudes (near 40°) in both the Northern and Southern hemispheres, in the vicinity of the Ferrel cells, which interface the Hadley and Polar cells. The detectable amplitude and rapid response of surface temperatures to decadal solar forcing is consistent with prior analyses of NCEP data, and suggests that the response involves the large-scale dynamical circulation of the atmosphere [Haigh, 2003; van Loon et al., 2004].
[12] The 0.1 K (13-month mean) global solar cycle increase with modest warming at high latitudes (Figure 3) differs markedly from the 0.2 K solar cycle global increase dominated by significant high latitude warming that Camp and Tung [2007] derived by differencing solar cycle maximum and minimum epochs in the NCEP data. Their larger estimates of the solar cycle amplitude may be erroneous because of uncorrected volcanic cooling. Over the NCEP epoch decadal power in solar irradiance and volcanic aerosols is approximately in phase during two of the last five solar cycles. This is illustrated in Figure 4, which compares time variations in solar, volcanic and ENSO power in a band from 8.5 to 12.8 years, isolated in the frequency domain by the FFT. Another explanation may be the significant contributions from high latitudes. The NCEP project assimilates available data onto model simulations so that the high latitude fields likely reflect modeled changes, since actual surface temperature observations are confined mainly to the region from 65°S to 70°N [Brohan et al., 2006].”
>> bushbunny says:(May 31, 2014 at 8:15 pm):
>>With 656 replies to Willis’ essay, what is our conclusion.
i assume you’re using the royal “our”
my conclusion is that the science of solar effects on earth’s climate is definitely not a settled sience – and that’s its effects are blended in the climate forcing soup – and are difficult – if not impossible to detect – now i know not to go into a climate battle with solar cycle’s blazing
researchers looked at events and found the solar cycle underneath – Willis and others have looked at a solar cycle and didn’t find any events – that’s the type of conundrum that can make exciting science
i for one am interested in the effects of the earth’s magnetic field – others have mentioned it too – its current turbulence might indicate a shift about to occur – i heard in passing that that is accompanied by dramatic climate change – but i heard nothing in detail
thanks Willis
IMO “climate scientists” today d*nying a significant solar influence on climate are akin to those earth scientists of 50 years ago who d*nied that the continents move or that gigantic catastrophic floods can shape the landscape. What might be lacking however is a sufficiently convincing explanation for solar effects comparable to seafloor spreading for observed & inferred continental drift in the 1950s to ’60s & natural selection for observed & inferred evolution in the 1850s to ’60s. IMO one such explanatory mechanism is CCNs induced by GCRs & another could be the effect of UV variation on stratospheric ozone.